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Date: Tue, 7-Apr-87 14:31:16 EST
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Path: decwrl!pyramid!sas
From: sas@pyrps5 (Scott Schoenthal)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards,mod.computers.pyramid
Subject: Re: Errors that can't happen !
Summary: Pyramid  directory  NFS  fix
Message-ID: <1857@pyramid.UUCP>
Date: 7 Apr 87 18:56:14 GMT
References: <535@ssl-macc.co.uk> <106@otc.OZ>
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In article <106@otc.OZ>, adjg@otc.OZ (Andrew Gollan) writes:
> in article <535@ssl-macc.co.uk>, ray@ssl-macc.co.uk (Ray Saxton) says:
> > ...
> > rfs_read: attempt to read from non-file
> > rfs_read: attempt to read from non-file
> > ...
> > ....
> > 
> 
> We get it on a small network of a Pyramid 90X and two sun 3/50s (one
> server, one client). It seems to happen when the Pyramid mounts a sun
> FS. We also have some other funnies with the Sun-Pyramid NFS since we
> upgraded the Suns to Release 3.2 (Directories cannot be read by the ATT
> universe read system call).

We're in the process of making available the fix for the case in which the
user attempts to read a directory from the att universe via NFS to a
Sun running SunOS 3.2 or later.

The "rfs_read" message occurs when the server side detects that a client
wishes to read a vnode which is not a regular file.  This may be either
a directory, a block special, or character special.  The Sun NFS 3.2
reference implementation (that is the Vax/NFS implementation provided to
NFS vendors such as Pyramid) provides hooks to the client to interpret
special devices locally rather than ship the read (or write) over the
wire.  Very useful when one begins to consider the issues of accessing
a root partition from a diskless NFS client.

I can't speak for the scenario in which both the client and server are
Suns except to note the previous paragraph.  On the Pyramid, ucb universe
directory reads (and all reads, for that matter) should work with
SunOS 3.2.  In the att universe, directory reads will work versus servers
earlier than SunOS 3.2 without the fix.

sas
-------------------------
Scott Schoenthal        Pyramid Technology Corp.      Mountain View, Ca.
        {allegra,decwrl,hplabs,ut-sally,utzoo}!pyramid!sas