This section presents information about installing Windows 95 source files on NetWare servers, automating Setup for NetWare workstations, support for long filenames on NetWare servers, and where to place user profiles and system policy files on NetWare servers.
The Windows 95 master files can be placed on a NetWare server to be used as source files for installing Windows 95 locally on NetWare workstations, or to be used as a shared copy for running Windows 95 across the network. To create a directory structure and place the Windows 95 source files on a server, you must run Server-based Setup (NETSETUP.EXE), the administrative setup program provided on the Windows 95 compact disc. (This is roughly equivalent to setup /a in Windows 3.x and Windows for Workgroups.)
This should be a network computer that is running a local copy of Windows 95 and that is used only by support personnel for network maintenance. Make sure you log on with security privileges that allow you to create directories and copy files to the file server.
You can create automatic installation procedures for installing Windows 95 on multiple workstations. The steps include the following:
For a complete description of the procedures for preparing and managing automatic installation of Windows 95 on multiple computers, see Chapter 5, "Custom, Automated, and Push Installations."
Computers running Windows 95 can use long filenames on NetWare 3.x and 4.x volumes configured to use the OS/2 namespace, which emulates an HPFS volume. Filenames on such NetWare volumes have a maximum length of 254 characters and use an 8.3 truncation on the first instance of the filename. For example:
longfilenameold.tst --> LONGFILE.TST
longfilenamenew.tst --> LONGFIL0.TST
If you have problems with this procedure, contact Novell for more information.
When you use long filenames for files on a NetWare volume while running Windows 95, the following exceptions occur:
To avoid these problems, use Windows Explorer. Otherwise, avoid long directory names if you do a lot of work at the command prompt.
NetWare 3.11 servers experience problems with applications that open a large number of files. Error messages report these problems as sharing or lock violations, or report a "file not found" error when you know the file exists, or report other errors in opening files. Novell supplies a patch for this problem, which you can obtain from the Novell forum on CompuServe®.
However, if you have not applied the patch, this problem affects how NetWare 3.11 servers handle long filenames, even if the OS/2 namespace is enabled. To avoid such problems, Windows 95 Setup only enables long-filename support with NetWare servers version 3.12 or higher.
If the NetWare patch has been applied at your site, you can ensure support for long filenames with all NetWare servers by setting SupportLFN=2 in the following Registry key:
Hkey_Local_Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\Nwredir
The possible values for this Registry key are the following:
These values can also be set globally using system policies. The related policy name is Support Long Filenames under the policies for Client for NetWare Networks.
If computers running Windows 95 will be providing File and Printer Sharing Services for NetWare Networks, then the NetWare server providing access validation must be configured with a special WINDOWS_PASSTHRU account. This special account is used to support pass-through validation for user-level security.
For more information about configuring and managing pass-through and user-level security for Windows 95 on NetWare networks, see Chapter 14, "Security."
User profiles, which consist of the user-specific information in the Registry, can be used to ensure a consistent desktop for individual users who log on to multiple computers, or for multiple users logging on to the same computer. User profiles can be used on a NetWare network with computers configured to use Microsoft Client for NetWare Network. When a user account is created on a NetWare server, a subdirectory of the MAIL directory is created automatically for that user. Because a Mail directory is always available for each user, Windows 95 uses these individual directories to store user profiles. If you want to use user profiles to enforce a mandatory desktop, place the related USER.MAN file in the users' MAIL directories.
If you are using system policies to enforce specific desktop or system settings, the appropriate CONFIG.POL file must be stored in the SYS:PUBLIC directory on each NetWare server that users use as a preferred server. Windows 95 automatically downloads policies from this file.
For more information about using user profiles or creating system policies, see Chapter 15, "User Profiles and System Policies."