Understanding the NetWare Client Software

The NetWare DOS Requester Architecture

Backwards Compatibility with NETX Applications

The NETX.VLM program provides backwards compatibility with NETX and other older versions of the shell. Therefore, you do not need to run NETX or other versions of the shell with the NetWare DOS Requester.

Nevertheless, because the NetWare DOS Requester is a redirector on the back end of DOS, it performs differently than the NetWare Shell software under specific conditions.

NOTE:See “Compatibility with NetWare Shell Parameters” under “NetWare DOS Requester Option,” in Chapter 2 of NetWare Client for DOS and MS Windows Technical Reference for more information.

The following figure shows a comparison of the NETX and the NetWare

DOS Requester architectures.

NETX

DOS Requester

NETX

NETX.VLM

 

DOS

 

NetWare DOS

IPXODI

Requester

DOS

 

IPXODI

Link

Link

Support

Support

Layer

Layer

LAN

LAN

driver

driver

Network

Network

board

board

Figure 2-3

Comparison of NETX and NetWare DOS Requester Architecture

The NetWare DOS Requester offers several improvements over NETX:

Provides a modular architecture that has advantages for current and future

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