Networking in DOS 6.22

Mad Professor · 23 Sep 2013 at 12:12

Good day all.

It's been a long time since I needed to do dos related networking, But it seems the time as once again called.

I am working on an old Industrial CNC Lathe, this lathe has a build in PC in the control box, and as per the title is running good old DOS 6.22 plus the needed software to run the lathe it's self.

At this point in time the only way to load a new g-code program into the lathe software is via 3.5" floppy disk.

So this means the CAD/CAM computer has to have a floppy disk drive, then copy the needed data onto the floppy disk, then be loaded on the lathe.

I would like not to have to use the floppy disks at all, and have all the g-code program files on a NAS, so that the CAD/CAM computer and the Lathe can both have access to any needed files.

As said above the Lathe build in PC is running DOS 6.22, I have installed Network Client, and installed an old 3COM 3c905c network card, this is connected to the rest of the network via stp-cat5e cable.

I am looking for help and advice with regards to settings this up.

Any advice or web links would be grate.

Thanks for your time.

Best Regards.

mod1fied · 23 Sep 2013 at 12:18

Having read this page: http://www.legroom.net/howto/msdos#network
and with a little knowledge I would say you could use a NFS server on the NAS and connect using the NFS client (XFS) in DOS.

Hope this helps

Caged · 23 Sep 2013 at 14:45

Surely you're better off with something like this?

http://embeddedsw.net/EMUFDD_Floppy_Hardware_Emulator_Home.html

Mad Professor · 29 Sep 2013 at 10:17

Thanks for your replies.

mod1fied: I have been reading over the linked web site.

Caged: The hardware does look nice, but at this point in time we are going to try the software only route.

At this point in time, I am still having grate problems being able to access any shared folders on the network.

I have been able to access the shared folder on my windows 7 computer from the dos computer once, but after restarting both the windows 7 and dos computers I have been unable to reconnect again.

For testing I have my main Windows 7 computer, and an old Laptop running Windows XP.

On both computers I have made a folder on the C: drive called Temp, and shared it.
At 1st I could not access the windows 7 shared folder from the windows xp laptop, but after some time checking the windows firewall, and network sharing settings, I now have both the windows 7 and windows xp computers accessing each others files.

But I am still not having much luck with the Dos Networking.

From the dos computer if I run "ipconfig c:\net" I get a report back showing all the ip addresses.

I can ping both the windows xp and windows 7 computers from the dos computer.

From the dos computer if I run "net view" I just keep getting the following error.

Error 6118: The list of servers for this workgroup is not currently available.

And if I try and force a connection "net use z: \\computername\sharedfolder" I just get this error.

Error 53: The computer name specified in the network path cannot be located.

This is very strange as like I said above I have had the Windows 7 and Dos computer working once, and was able to view and edit files.

Can anyone please advice.

Thanks for your time.

Best Regards.

Mad Professor · 29 Sep 2013 at 12:25

I have just installed samba on my Linux server, and now when I type "net view" on the dos computer, I see a list of all the other computers on the network, But if the Linux server or samba is not running, and I type "net view" I get the above "Error 6118".

All very strange, but at least I am getting somewhere now.