M-Node TCP/IP Clients Fail to Register All Names

• Microsoft TCP/IP-32 for Windows for Workgroups, versions 3.11, 3.11a, 3.11b

SYMPTOMS

If you use m-node TCP/IP-32bit Windows for Workgroups clients and your primary WINS server is down, TCP/IP will fail to register all names with the backup WINS server.

CAUSE

When using m-node clients with TCP/IP, it will try to register names by first using broadcasts. If broadcasts fail, it will try the primary WINS server, and if this fails, it goes to the backup WINS server.

NetBIOS registration occurs during the startup of Windows for Workgroups. It starts sending all registration requests to the backup after the other two methods have failed. Because the secondary WINS server is up, it will reply to the Name Registration request. The Name Registration request code sees a response and acts accordingly. One of the things the Name Registration request code does is check to see where the reply came from. If it determines that the response came back from the backup, it will swap the primary and secondary addresses so that it will now go to the backup.

Because it has not completed sending out all the Name Registers, it continues sending the next Name Register to the backup server. Because the Name Registration request code has swapped the backup and primary addresses, it now sends to the primary again, and these names fail to get registered.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Microsoft TCP/IP-32 for Windows for Workgroups. A fix to this problem is in development, but has not been regression-tested and may be destabilizing in production environments. Microsoft does not recommend implementing this fix at this time. Contact Microsoft Product Support Services for more information on the availability of this fix.

Additional query words: networking

Keywords : wfwg nttcp
Version : :3.11,3.11a,3.11b
Platform : WINDOWS
Issue type :