Re: Dosemu packet driver, IPX

[Stas Sergeev <stssppnn@yahoo.com>]

Hello.

Kara Van Horn wrote:
> When I tried adding WINPKT.COM (as
> mentioned in the docs) to my IPX stack (WINPKT replacing PDIPX, 
> followed by
> VLM), and specified a packet driver address as 0x60, it said there was 
> not one at that location.
Make sure that $_vnet is *off* and then:

E:\TEMP\PKTDRV>winpkt.com 0x60
Virtual packet driver for Windows 3.x, version 11.2
Portions Copyright 1991 Roger F. James
Packet driver skeleton copyright 1988-90, Russell Nelson.
This program is free software; see the file COPYING for details.
NO WARRANTY; see the file COPYING for details.

And never forget about logging.
-D9+Pn will help you in that quest.

> I installed the dosnet.o module into the kernel,
> configured the dsn0 interface to have a subnet of 192.168.144.0, and 
> routed
> a gateway for that same network out my linux box to eth0.  $_vnet is on 
In case you want to have dosnet, you have
to give root permissions to dosemu.

> I tried both setuid root on and off the dosnet executable.
dosnet.o is not an executable, it is a
kernel module.

> I also wasn't sure if I could also run the Greg Page suite of IPX tools
> (i.e., ipx_configure, ipx_interface, et. al.) in conjunction with any 
> Dosemu
> functionality.
For this you have to configure IPX under
linux and turn $_ipxsupport on. This seem
to be possible. You have to disable dosnet
in that case, I think.
And if you turn IPX on, you don't need
pdipx any more.
If you have $_ipxsupport disabled, you can't
use IPX tools.

> requires a constant IPX connection (through a watchdog TSR).  This is 
> when
> the application fails, and I traced it back to this packet driver 
> issue.
Dosemu's internal IPX support seems to be
independant from dosemu's packet driver
because it utilises linux kernel IPX
functionality. So I don't think you have
tracked your problem correctly.

> I would also
> appreciate some idea as to the progress of the Dosemu programming 
> effort.
No (active) developers. If you need 
some functionality, you have to
contribute yourself:(
IPX is out of maintenance since 1997.

> It appears to be somewhat stalled, from what I can tell.
I agree. But you can always have a look
into the ChangeLog for details.

> I did not notice
> much interaction with the programmers and this list, either, which does 
> not bode well.
Dosemu have large enough user base
(just see the sourceforge stats to
get a clue of how large is it), but
no developers to support. Hence the
lack of the interraction and progress.
I really think that the users have to
contribute a little more in development
process if they want to have a fully
functional product.


PS: Everything I told about IPX is
based only on a single look at an
IPX code I made yesterday to find
out why doom's ipxsetup crashes.
So my info may be incorrect. I have
never used this functionality myself.
And even a single look to that code
was enough to find some bugs in it:(