A funny thing happened on the way to the printer

[Henrik Tuxen]

I have a 'funny' experience with the PC-NFS software. This experience
should be shared with the rest of the group, since others may experience
similar problems, if they stick to the SUN manuals.

We have recently installed the PC-NFS software in a number of PC
workstations (10), and I am watching with interest the mail on this
subject. We are using these workstations to develop software to run on
PC's and other target hardware, and are using the SUN as the centralized
storage medium for programs and source. Each of the PC are either AT-3 or
386 with at least 30 Mbyte disk.

The other day I had a 'funny' experience with the PCNFS software located
on our SUN 2/120 running OS 3.2.

The PCNFS software is installed as outline in chapter 4 of the PCNFS
manual, that is make rc.local start up the pcnfs deamon.  This works fine,
and everybody is happy. In addition to this we have 4 copies of nfsd and
biod running to handle the other things.

During the process of developing software I had the need to print 2 files
with the same extension. This I did using the

	net print *.lis

command, and the NFS software started and responded with

	Queueing file [DSP.LIS]
	Queueing file [DSPIF.LIS]
NFS045F: Remote procedure call to PCNFSD deamon on gnsun failed.

and no print appeared anywhere on our printer. I really needed that print,
so decided to print them one at a time. The net print command for the
DSP.LIS file came through ok, but the net print command for the DSPIF.LIS
file did not. The Queueing file...  message appeared on the PC screen and
after that I was the happy owner of one *V*E*R*Y* dead PC. The first file
was printed, but not the second.

After having said a suitable sequence of four-letter words, I started
investigating the problem. The conclusion I came to was that the pcnfsd
deamon (started by rc.local) only can handle one request at a time, and
does not queue the requests. The solution to the problem was to install a
line in /etc/servers like this:

rpc	udp	/usr/etc/rpc.pcnfsd	150001	1

and remove the activation from the rc.local file. As far as I could
remember, this should cause the nfsd to start the pcnfsd whenever needed.
And it did.

The conclusion is NOT to use the procedure in the PC-NFS manual when
installing the pcnfsd deamon, but to do it the other way.

Apart from this mishap, we are happy SUN owners and drivers.  The local
support here in Denmark are doing all they can, and a wee bit more to keep
us customers happy.

/htx at gnsun.dk

P.S. Thanks for the bulletin board, which supplies us with a lot
     of hard information on various problems.