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Messages - Doug Bissett

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931
Setup & Installation / Re: Problems with JFS
« on: May 12, 2016, 05:34:38 pm »
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and 1.09.06 was supposed to fix this problem.

I don't know about THIS problem. It is supposed to fix a problem where the file system gets damaged beyond repair. Since that is very rare, all I can say is that it hasn't happened to me again.

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We also established that the problem is not fixed by the current XWP beta.

That would be the shutdown problem where the final data never gets to the disk. We also don't know if that is what is causing your problem.

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Interesting that you have seen something similar - and probably related - when booting eCS within a virtualbox. I guess I should point David at this discussion in the hope that he can formulate some ideas about this problem.

I am not sure that I would say "Probably" related. More like "possibly" related. I am more inclined to think that is a VBOX problem where it doesn't attach the drive on the first try. It never needs a CHKDSK when it does get attached. A normal warm reboot, gets it attached.

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Far easier if the server has a crash to simply let the config.sys statement

  IFS=M:\OS2\JFS.IFS /LW:5,20,4 /AUTOCHECK:+*

sort out any problems that the crash may have caused the filesystem. Of course, you need JFS-1.09.05 or earlier to do that.

Personally, I have never, yet, seen any reason to even think about forcing a CHKDSK on reboot (real, or virtual, machines). The normal CHKDSK, if the disk is found dirty, rarely finds anything to fix, other than to mark it clean.

My "headless server" does have the devices attached, but they might as well not be there. I do have a problem with that machine where the BIOS, and the OS, don't agree on which disk is first, but LVM seems to look after that (but an Air Boot programed restart is confused). It is my eCS based NAS box. An old P4 with a SATA adapter card, and a 2 TB disk for storage (it was 1 TB until recently). Booting is done from an older 200 GB IDE drive.

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If you like you can test this version or I can compile you a version with 1s delay. I guess you will not like to make much testing with your server but if yes, let me know.

I am pretty sure that 500 ms is not enough, and 4s is too much (but it seems to be safe). It is my opinion that a minimum of 1 second should be implemented, with an option of 2 seconds (for slow disks, in fast machines). One (or 4) extra second(s) to get it turned off will never be a problem, while having corrupted INI data, or having to wait for a CHKDSK on boot, can waste a LOT of time.

932
Setup & Installation / Re: Booting OS/2 from USB pen drive
« on: May 09, 2016, 04:51:49 pm »
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I don't really understand why or where this restriction lies... I guess it would need OS2KRNL modifications....

It is partly that (which is basically impossible without the source code), but the main problem is that there is a period of time when there is no access to the boot drive, and everything just stops working.

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I wonder if it's possible to script this process, as it sounds quite error prone for someone who wants to try it out.

It will be included in bootAble (https://hrbaan.home.xs4all.nl/bootAble/), when I get it properly documented, and Hayo Baan gets it properly coded. It is somewhat difficult for Hayo because he only has eCS in a virtual machine, but it does work that way.

933
Setup & Installation / Re: Booting OS/2 from USB pen drive
« on: May 08, 2016, 05:46:54 pm »
Can anyone explain why it isn't possible to boot (or install) OS/2 from a USB pen drive?

To answer your question, you cannot get access to USB drives early enough in the boot sequence to make it work.

However, it IS possible. I have done it by hacking the bootAble project, but it is not, yet, properly documented.

Briefly, the basic setup is:
Create a small (50 meg is more than enough) FAT16 partition on the stick.
Make the remainder of the stick into either HPFS or JFS (I use JFS, and it must be large enough to contain whatever you want to include, which could be the OS/2 or eCS, installer).
Create a bootAble CD image (you need to understand how bootAble does that).
Manually modify that to remove the MEMDISK stuff (The QSINIT RAMDRIVE will be used).
ZIP that whole partition (ZDRIVE.ZIP), rather than use TAR as bootAble normally does.
Follow the instructions in the QSINIT package to be able to boot from the QSINIT PAE RAMDRIVE.
Manually put the rest of the bootAble stuff (anything that normally ends up on a CD/DVD, or in the old RAMFS RAMDISK) onto the second partition, and modify CONFIG.SYS (must be in the ZIP file) to have proper paths etc.

Now, if your computer will boot the QSINIT loader, that will unzip the file into the RAMDISK (must be FAT16), then boot from it. Note that you will have no access to the second partition until the USB driver gets loaded, and initialized (usually around the time that the GUI starts up), so anything that is needed earlier must be in the ZIP file that gets loaded to the QSINIT RAMDISK. Also remember that anything in the RAMDISK must be FAT16, with 8.3 file names.

Much experimenting is probably required, and there are a couple of variations, if you want to play with the QSINIT RAMDISK.

934
Setup & Installation / Re: Problems with JFS
« on: May 07, 2016, 08:23:11 am »
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Here at work we have a healthy respect for the problems that JFS formatted disks can have, we 'lost' just on 450GB of data that was on a JFS volume when something went wrong with the data structures and since there is no reliable way of recovering any of the data we had to reformat that partition and restore from backup.  Since then all our JFS partitions are backed up twice a day with incremental backups and there is NO way we will use a bootable JFS volume.  All bootable partitiond on the workstations are HPFS and on the servers HPFS386.

Other than the known problem in JFS 1.09.05 (which is very rare, and CHKDSK was of no help, at all), which was fixed in 1.09.06, I have had no problems with JFS. I have simply quit using anything except JFS and FAT32 (for windows compatibility). JFS boot partitions are bullet proof. Far more reliable than HPFS ever was (I have never used HPFS386). Getting rid of HPFS also freed up a good chunk of low shared memory space, which solved a couple of other problems. Bootable JFS is also noticeably faster than HPFS. FWIW, your problem sounds a lot like what was fixed in JFS 1.09.06.

One of the problems with trying to recover data from a damaged disk (all platforms, all formats, even with RAID) is that there is now so much data, that it is difficult to manage it all. My brother accidentally deleted a couple of files on a 1 TB partition, with about 400 GB of data on it (it was NTFS in windows, on USB 3.0). We tried DFSEE, and it took 70 hours to scan the disk, but it appeared that the files were overwritten almost immediately, so they weren't found. Fortunately, they weren't critical.

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Is there any chance of checking your disks for bad sectors? Not sure what you would use... maybe DFSee...

It is highly unlikely that multiple systems would have bad sectors (especially with modern disk drives). It is more likely that his setup has some trap in it that gets duplicated across his systems. That is why I suggested that a startup conflict is likely what is causing the problem. JFS 1.09.06 starts up a lot faster than the older versions, and something may not be quite ready when other things get started. Fixing startup conflicts is more of an art than a science, and they can cause problems at boot time, while you are running, and even at shutdown. It all depends on what happens, and when. The usual fix is to introduce some extra delays, or reorder the startup sequence. I had one VM that would hang every time the GUI started up. The "fix" was to reduce the processor to 50% until the rest of the system was installed (which added more things to CONFIG.SYS). After the install, I was able to put it back to 100%, and it has caused no further problems. Unfortunately, you can't do that with a real system (not easily anyway).

935
Setup & Installation / Re: Problems with JFS
« on: May 06, 2016, 10:10:43 pm »
This is a very strange problem. I will add my thoughts, and comments.

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After installing JFS-1.09.06 from Arca Noae my system can "lose" a volume at boot. The first time this happened I only noticed after the Desktop had loaded and I opened the Drives folder to use the "missing" drive.

I have never seen anything like that on my real hardware. I do, however, see something similar in one of my VBox systems (win7 host on my Lenovo T510, multiple versions of VBox). Every once in a while, it fails to attach one of the drives, for no apparent reason. FWIW, this was also happening with JFS 1.09.05.

The virtual system consists of:
2G boot drive C: eCS 2.1, AHCI attached bootable JFS.
2G boot drive M: eCS 2.2b2, AHCI attached bootable JFS.
15G data/programs W: AHCI attached advanced JFS.

Each is an individual *.VDI file. The first (C:) has AirBoot installed.

When the problem happens, the W: drive is not attached, and a reboot always works. It seems to be slightly different from what you describe, but it could be related, somehow.

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I am assured there is nothing wrong with the driver...

I use JFS on a number of different systems, including VBox machines. Other than the above anomaly (which looks more like it could be a flaw in VBox), I have seen no problems. I did see one case of the known problem with JFS 1.09.05, which was pretty nasty. Fortunately, it happened on a USB attached backup drive, and it was easily recovered (full partition recreation, and format, then do the backups again). You won't see me going back to anything earlier than JFS 1.09.06.

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The XWP beta does not make any difference - does not seem to be anything wrong with the XWP beta

The XWP beta seems to work better than any of the "official" releases, but I am pretty sure that there is still a shutdown problem, if you don't use the setting to delay shutdown. I haven't seen your problem, but I did have some INI file corruption after a couple of shutdowns without the delay. I turned the delay back on, and I haven't had any problems since then (but I have only power cycled about 3 times). I do notice that the latest ACPI actually powers off my machine on a reboot, where earlier versions (and win 7 and 10) don't do that. It doesn't seem to vause any problems though.

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What can I be doing wrong on my range of hardware?

It is probably a startup conflict of some sort. How do you sort your CONFIG.SYS? I always use my LCSS (Logical ConfigSys Sort) package (HOBBES), and on faster machines, I find that I need to introduce one, or two, 2 second delays at strategic spots, to avoid other problems. I use http://www.tavi.co.uk/os2pages/utils/delay.zip. One right after the IFS entries, and one at the end (LCSS will respect the positions, when it can).

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Strange... why should these drives be "dirty but is marked clean"?

Good question. I don't ever remember seeing that message, but others seem to have problems, for some reason.

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My suggestion: Do *not* use JFS-1.09.06 on a "headless" server.

Again, this doesn't really make sense. I don't use my eCS based NAS box headless, but the screen is normally turned off. I find no reason to want to run CHKDSK (although I do, sometimes, just because...). Over the last few years, I don't remember any case where CHKDSK ever found anything bad on any of my JFS drives, even when I need to use the reset button. That could be coincidence, but JFS tends to keep itself clean.

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unless anyone can come up with any other possibilities?

You wouldn't have an old version of CHKDSK, or UJFS.DLL, hiding somewhere, would you?

936
Applications / Re: Config sys editor
« on: April 28, 2016, 09:26:54 pm »
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Does anyone have any recommendations?

Try http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/download/pub/os2/util/config/lcss-0-4-8.wpi

It is designed to make CONFIG.SYS human readable, as well as order it correctly. Please READ the instructions, and get the latest update from http://www3.telus.net/public/bissett1/LCSS.dat.

937
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Point your web browser to 192.168.0.1. I hope the admin password is included in the router documentation.

You should get the control panel for the D-Link 506L.

You may also get your router, depending on which mode the 506l is in.

938
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Richard, the D-Link unit is overkill for what you want. It is also a so and so to setup since it requires a wireless enabled computer to start with.

It may be overkill, but it works, and it is very handy for other things. It does not require a wireless computer to start with. It can be configured through the wired connection. It does get tricky when it is in Repeater mode (required for what the OP wants to do) because the IP address is not easy to find in OS/2 (it is easy in windows).

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ping 127.0.0.1

What has that got to do with ethernet? That is the localhost address.

939
I can't find a reliable way to find the address, when it is in Repeater mode, other than to look in the router to see what address it got. Most of the time, you cannot do that.

For those who might think of another way: In Repeater mode, it uses the router, that the DIR-506l is connected to to get an address for itself (the DIR-506l). The computer that you connect also uses the router that the DIR-506l is connected to to get an address. Neither one is guaranteed to be the same as it was previously. You can PING the devices, and find a possible address, but every device that is connected to either the DIR-506l or the router that it is attached to, will respond (but only if it happens to be on the same IP address range). In some cases, that could be thousands of addresses. The DIR-506l is supposed to respond to the name that you assign to it (I think that is "DLINK_DIR-506l.local" by default - I changed mine), but Firefox always seems to want to use "www.DLINK_DIR-506l.local", and that doesn't work. Firefox in windows doesn't have that problem, and it can always find the device, no matter what address range it happens to take.

The only other way, that I know of, is to reset the DIR-506l to factory. Then it will assign a compatible address to the computer, and Firefox will go to the name "DLINK_DIR-506l.local". That takes you to the setup wizard, which does the rest. After it restarts itself, you may need to ask for a new DHCP address (or reboot). After all of that, it should continue to work (even if powered off), until you need to connect it to another address range.

940
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I have eCS as the only operating system on my PC so I was hoping that there was a way to configure the 506L from within ecomstation.


It can be done, easily, once you know what IP addreses to use. The wired NIC and the device, need to be on the same IP address range, or they can't talk to each other (it may be possible with some routing, but i never bothered to figure that out). http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/download/pub/os2/util/network/tcpip/ipprf_10.zip is useful for making temporary IP configurations, and getting back to the normal one, but it can't find the address for you.

I will spend a few minutes to see if I can find a way to do it.

941
I have one of them. It is a GREAT device. The biggest "PROBLEM" is that the ethernet port only runs at 100 Mbs while the wireless will work at 300 Mbs (or perhaps even faster).

There is a trick to making it work as you want to. It must be used in Repeater mode, and it is a bit of a pain to get it running using OS/2 unless it happens to get the same IP range that you have the computer set for (You can't log into it). I usually do it with windows (to save a lot of messing around). Once it is connected, you can reboot to OS/2 and it will work, as long as your wired NIC will work (no special setup required). It looks to OS/2 as a wired network connection.

If I remember correctly, when you log in to the DIR-506L, it goes to the setup wizard were you select the mode (Repeater), then it asks for the access point (or router) to attach to. Then (the confusing part), it wants a device name, and configuration (including password) for other devices to log into the DIR-506L (other wireless devices can use it as a router). After a DIR-506L restart you need to ask for a DHCP renewal (or reboot) to get OS/2 to ask for an IP address.

Some experimenting may be required.

942
Applications / Re: Fonts in Lotus Word Pro
« on: February 27, 2016, 08:55:04 pm »
Just a WAG, but LSS was always pretty picky about printer drivers. Perhaps uninstalling what you have, and re-installing them might change the situation.

943
Networking / Re: OS/2: Connect to Windows 7
« on: February 20, 2016, 11:10:19 pm »
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So, what options to change? What parameters to verify?

Google using XP with windows 7, and it should get you into the right area, but I think windows 7 will no longer allow anything that it doesn't know about.

One other thing, that may still work, is to get http://www.88watts.net/download/netbeui.zip, which might still work in windows 7 (I haven't tried it). That should allow OS/2 to use NETBIOS (not NETBIOS over TCPIP) to connect to windows 7. You may run into problems doing it though because some devices (routers, WiFi, etc.) won't pass the data packets.

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The big problem is trying to use samba CLIENT on OS/2-eCS and seeing the samba server on win 7.

SAMBA server on windows 7? I never tried that. I just use the windows built in server, which doesn't talk to our client. I don't think the problem is with the server itself, the problem is getting past the security crap in windows 7. We probably have the same problems with OSX, but I don't know that, for sure.

944
Networking / Re: OS/2: Connect to Windows 7
« on: February 20, 2016, 06:55:47 am »
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SAMBA Server is a separate topic.

Not if you want to communicate between windows, and eCS.

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OS/2 Samba Client, is it compatible with Windows 7 with Service Pack 1?

SP1 is ancient, in windows terms. I wouldn't even consider trying to use windows 7 at that level any more. I don't remember if SP1 was what screwed it up, or if that came later (later, I suspect). In any case, to get windows 7 to talk to eCS SAMBA client, you need to turn off most (or all) of the security stuff in windows. Even then, it may not work any more.

945
Networking / Re: OS/2: Connect to Windows 7
« on: February 19, 2016, 08:59:39 pm »
It used to work, a few years ago, but microsoft changed the rules, and the current SAMBA client isn't smart enough to keep up.

If you find the instructions for making windows XP work with windows 7, you might be able to get it to go, but that involves turning off most of the, so called, windows security (and I don't think windows 10 will work anyway).

As I understand it, there is a new SAMBA version in development, and even windows 10 should work with it (until microsoft changes the rules again), but that is about all that I know about it.

I have had no problems with installing the SAMBA server in eCS, and using windows (even 10) as a client, so that is what I use.

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