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From: boyd@ausmelb.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: Errors that can't happen !
Message-ID: <140@ausmelb.OZ>
Date: Mon, 6-Apr-87 20:54:25 EST
Article-I.D.: ausmelb.140
Posted: Mon Apr  6 20:54:25 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Apr-87 06:17:42 EST
References: <535@ssl-macc.co.uk> <106@otc.OZ>
Reply-To: boyd@ausmelb.UUCP (Boyd Roberts)
Distribution: world
Organization: Austec International Limited, Melbourne
Lines: 29

>in article <535@ssl-macc.co.uk>, ray@ssl-macc.co.uk (Ray Saxton) says:
> We are running a Sun 3/160 (3.2) with 2 Eagles as a server to a network
> of Sun 2/50 & 3/50 ( some 3.2 most 2.0) and on random occasions
> we get this message in the console window. 
> rfs_read: attempt to read from non-file
> rfs_read: attempt to read from non-file
> ...
> ....
> 

I'd say it's some sort of incompatibility between the various NFS
flavours you have.  The message probably results from a read of a
remote directory.  In early releases (2.0) it was ok to read directories
(but not exactly sensible) and there was the getdirentries() syscall.

I think the trend in later releases (3.0?) was to dissallow directory
reading (my friends at SUN can correct me here...).  Things that need to read
directories should use getdirentries().  Getdirentries() returns directory
names in a machine independant way.

Other causes may be due to a remote read of an un-supported object
(ie. remote device, socket (BSD) or named pipe (SYSV)).

Can you *see* the transparency?

--
Boyd Roberts			boyd@ausmelb.oz

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro...
D