Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!samsung!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!psuvax1!husc6!m2c!wpi!ear
From: ear@wpi.wpi.edu (Eric A Rasmussen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.programmer
Subject: Re: Networked PC (without hard disc)
Message-ID: <9527@wpi.wpi.edu>
Date: 9 Mar 90 07:16:46 GMT
References: <1990Mar6.180320.28421@axion.bt.co.uk>
Reply-To: ear@wpi.wpi.edu (Eric A Rasmussen)
Organization: Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester ,MA
Lines: 45

In article <1990Mar6.180320.28421@axion.bt.co.uk> iwarner@axion.bt.co.uk writes:
>	I am trying out a PC configuration whereby the PC has no hard disc,
>but gets all of its stuff from a networked disc. The floppy drive is used to
>boot up MS-DOS & PC-NFS initially, and then (it is hoped), the network drive(s)
>should take over. I am using Sun PC-NFS for this purpose - this allows the
>PC to be served by Unix NFS servers.

My father's PC business does exactly this with a Novell network. (Which is not
to say that other networks cannot do this as well)  For example, in the
purchasing dept. is an IBM PC-A (The kind that has 64k on the motherboard and
CAN'T take a hard drive, any video above CGA, or memory above 548k unless you
replace the bios.) that boots Novell off a floppy and instantly becomes a
usefull machine because it can make use of the nice fast hard drive in the
fileserver.

>	I also have encountered one problem: when exiting from MicroSoft Word,
>the beast insists on reading COMMAND.COM from the floppy drive (A:) from whence
>it was booted. I need to tell it to look on the network drive, but NOT when
>first booting up. When powering up command.com, autoexec & config.sys are
>all read from a system floppy. This also contains code to boot up & log in to
>PC-NFS. Once this has been done, all interaction should be with the networked
>drives.

Try adding the following line at the BEGINNING of the autoexec.bat file on
the boot disks:

COMMAND f:\pathname /P

Where f:\pathname is the network drive and path for where to find command.com
over the NFS.  I would recommend making sure the version of DOS on the network
drive is the same as the one you are booting with. 

This method will probably take up about 4k more of memory than normal, but I
think it will solve your problem.  (For more info on the COMMAND command,
consult your DOS manual).  There is also a way to tell the machine where to
boot straight from config.sys, but if you want to boot off the network, the
NFS system must be up and running before you try to read command.com.  I don't
believe Novell becomes effective until after you run command.com. 

Of course, you could just solve the whole problem by using a real editor such
as WordStar. :-)      (No flame wars please) 
 _                _                                         +-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+
|_  ,_  .   _    |_}   _    _  ,_ _         _   _   _   ,_  | ear@wpi.wpi.edu |
|_  |   |  |_    | \  |_\  _>  | | |  |_|  _>  _>  |_'  | | | ear%wpi@wpi.edu |
--< A real engineer never reads the instructions first! >-- +-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+