Last week I posted the following message:
> We have a small Novell network that we wish to connect to our Sun
> network mainly for the purposes of backing up the Novell network. We
> do have the Novell TCP/IP stuff but not the NFS package.
>
> I am sure that this has been done before, what I am after is some
> advice on potential pitfalls involved (TFM makes it look
> straightforward - is it lying?). Also I am not certain, assuming the
> suns and novell are happily networked, how to go about performing the
> backup of the novell network. If we had Novell nfs I would nfs mount
> the servers disks and dump them but I don't have that luxury. Are
> there any other mechanisms that will allow me to backup the Novell
> server from the suns?
>
Since then I have had a few replies from people who have done this and
lots of requests for a summary. The consensus seems to be to use
netware NFS (though some people may want to look closely at the
software offering from Prime) but this has some problems - namely all
the permissions are not propagated across the NFS mount. I am still
investigating the problem and will followup if I find a better
solution. Thanks to all that responded. Here are the messages I
received:
>From patti@sse.com Sat Jul 11 03:22:32 1992
Hi Brett:
We are a Sun VAR and had the luxury of taking a SPARC to the Phila. office
of Novell and actually testing the NFS NLM. I f read you right, you may
not have the option to get it... But if you can, acquire it! It works
beautifully using the Novell server from the SUN side...
FYI - We dealt with an excellent tech there named Roger something or another.
If you really want his name, I can get it for you. Just call dir. asst.
(office actually located in Berwyn, PA I think), and then call Novell and ask
for OH YEA, Roger Stephens was his name - he knew his Novell....
patti Stirk
Soft Systems Engineering
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>From beecher@watsun.cc.columbia.edu Tue Jul 14 00:16:20 1992
The folks at Novell simply say that backups over NFS don't work and
are not supported. I have a few ideas about how to make it work,
though. The problem is there are more directory bits in a NetWare
directory than in a Unix directory, and some information is
transferred to the Unix system with an NFS mount and some information
is not. Global read/write permissions are available under NFS, but
NetWare-only bits such as sharable, purgable, hidden, execute-only,
etc. are not available under NFS. Some information such as trustee
rights and group membership is stored in the bindery so you must
backup the bindery separately. Inherited rights masks are stored in
the NetWare directory so that information probably will not be backed
up over NFS.
Ben
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From: Michael Panosh - Value Added Services, PrimeService Australia <MWP.MICHAEL@MELPN1.Prime.COM>
Date: Fri, 10 Jul 1992 14:29:24 +1000
Brett,
PrimeService (a division of Prime) have Novell server software that
integrates Novell and Sun seamlessly. Basically it makes the Sun a
non-dedicated Novell file server, with 90% of the facilities you would
expect when using a PC server. Speed is good, install is easy and users
do not notice any difference between the SPARC and a 386...
NFS comes free, as the BSD file system on the Sun is used and it allows
you to mount extra devices directly in the Novell Volume file space (so
adding extra disk for Novell clients is easy...mount either a new hard
disk or NFS disk to increase space).
Cheers, Michael Panosh mwp.michael@melpn1.prime.com
PrimeService
Australia
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>From melissa@broccoli.cc.columbia.edu Fri Jul 10 23:51:51 1992
I don't have a solution for you, but I would like to hear what you
find out. We have a Novell system, and have also been trying to
figure out how to back it up via our Unix machines. We *do* have the
NFS option, but unfortunately a lot of the file flags (copy on write
or some such) don't "show" through the NFS mounting, so we can't make
complete backups this way.
Melissa Metz
Unix Systems Group
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-- Brett Lymn Computer Systems Administrator AWA Defence Industries
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