Ping a novell server

Hi Robert,

You need to make certain that you have the TCP/IP protocol installed on the Novell server in order to PING it. Novell normally uses IPX/SPX protocol.

Protocols are like languages, TCP/IP=English IPX/SPX=French, no common language=can't talk.

So in order to PING the Novell server, you would have to install the TCP/IP protocol, since PING is a TCP/IP tool.

Can you browse the Novell server? If so, you must have some common language installed.
Don

Because you are trying to ping the server we can safely assume that you know that tcp/ip is installed. The error you get is the fact that the servername cannot be resolved by the ping utility. This is because netbios naming (which is used by the windows server) is not used by the netware server. Therefore you must include the servername in your DNS or your local host file.
Try pinging the IP address of the server. This should work allright.

If you want to ping by servername you need the correct information in the hosts file, for example:
#
# SYS:ETC\HOSTS 9-10-98
#
# Mappings of host names and host aliases to IP address.
#
127.0.0.1 loopback lb localhost # normal loopback address

#
# examples from Novell network
#
130.57.4.2 ta tahiti ta.novell.com loghost
130.57.6.40 osd-frog frog
130.57.6.144 sj-in5 in5
192.67.172.71 sj-in1 in1

#
# interesting addresses on the Internet
#
192.67.67.20 sri-nic.arpa nic.ddn.mil nic
26.2.0.74 wsmr-simtel20.army.mil simtel20

192.168.30.101 lor_411
192.168.30.141 spare.dragonlair.lorch.com
192.168.30.100 puff

With this I can ping my server puff using puff and/or 192.168.30.100.

You have a couple of choices here. First, you could load TCP/IP on your NetWare servers and use that standard ping utility. Or, second you can download pingdg.exe and do and IPX ping from your workstation. And, third you can use IPXPING.NLM and ping one NetWare server from another NetWare server.
The best answer is load TCP/IP on your Novell servers.
If you are trying to monitor your servers to make sure they are up and running you could look into a product like ManageWise (from Novell) which can also do IPX pings.

Troubleshooting this starts with making sure TCP/IP is loaded on the Netware server and doing it's thing.

At the netware server console, type CONFIG, and hit enter. This will display what protocols are running on the server, and will display the IP address the NW server. Check for obvious mistakes like an incorrect netmask, duplicate IP address, etc. If IP is not bound to any network cards, there's the first thing to fix.

Armed with the IP address of the NetWare server, try to PING it from your Win2K workstation: PING 192.168.1.1 (or whatever the address is). If this fails, the problem is likely hardware -- bad cable, faulty hub/switch port, etc.

There's alos a ping utility at the NetWare server. Again at the console prompt, type PING 192.168.1.2 (or any valid address).

If the PING on the dotted ip address works, either add the server's host name to your DNS (or ask the network admin to), or add an entry for it to your HOSTS file on the workstation. The file is named 'hosts', no extention, and is in C:\WINNT\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\ETC.

HTH