NetWare 3.12 and 4.1: Default = 5 minutes 29.6 seconds
Increasing the Turbo FAT
5.3.1.4 Directory Caching
Directory caching allows fast access to frequently used directories. When NetWare receives a read request from a workstation, it begins by searching the directory and FAT cache to determine the location of the file which will ultimately be either on disk or in cache. A directory cache buffer is a portion of the file server memory that holds entries from the directory table. A directory entry stays in a cache buffer as long as it′s being accessed frequently.
The server will allocate a minimum number of directory cache buffers at boot time and then increase this value automatically as the demand grows for more buffers.
NetWare has parameters to set both the minimum and maximum number of buffers available for directory caching. These parameters can be increased to improve performance as directory service requests are more likely to be serviced from the cache. However, the following items should be considered:
∙If the minimum value is set too low, this will cause an unnecessary delay in the allocation of additional directory cache buffers, thus slowing response time to directory searches.
∙If the maximum value is set too high, this can consume too much memory and affect the file cache memory pool size. Therefore, the server must have enough memory to accommodate this increase.
There is also a parameter to affect the time delay before allocation takes place and this can be decreased to improve performance.
You can modify the values using set commands in the AUTOEXEC.BAT file as follows:
NetWare 3.12 and 4.1
SET MAXIMUM DIRECTORY CACHE BUFFERS=VALUE
Default = 500
Range = 20 to 4000
SET DIRECTORY CACHE ALLOCATION WAIT TIME=VALUE
Default = 2.2 seconds
Range = 0.5 to 120 seconds
