NSTL evaluates IBM OS/2 LAN Server 4.0, Microsoft Windows NT Server 3.5, and Novell NetWare 3.12 and 4.02
Tadesse W. Giorgis
The NOS (network operating system) wars are hotter than ever. With the release of Windows NT 3.5, Microsoft has delivered a stable, robust system that runs on a variety of high-end hardware. NT is now poised as a powerful applications server for the coming wave of 32-bit multithreaded Windows programs. IBM is making lots of noise, pushing a revamped OS/2 as a premier enterprise platform. And Novell, feeling the heat like never before, has revamped its venerable NOS from the bottom up, vowing to keep its market strangle-hold.
This month, NSTL evaluates four major players in the fierce NOS market: OS/2 LAN Server from IBM; Windows NT Advanced Server 3.5 from Micro
soft, and NetWare versions 3.12 and 4.02 from Novell. (Although NSTL originally planned to test Banyan Vines 5.54, hardware incompatibility forced us to drop the product from our evaluation.)
All of these products support multiple network interface cards in the server for multisegment network connections, although, to date, only Banyan and Novell allow internal bridging of multiple network segments in a single server. In addition to multiple adapter support on the server, the NOS product should be able to operate with large, multigigabyte disk array subsystems on Intel 386/486 and Pentium processors systems. Our evaluation criteria also required multiclient support (DOS, DOS/Windows, OS/2, Macintosh, and other desktop clients).
IBM OS/2 LAN Server 4.0
IBM's OS/2 LAN Server 4.0 provides resource sharing for files, printers, and serial devices among LAN Server, DOS LAN Requester (with and without Windows), and OS/2 LAN Requester systems on a Token Ring or Ethernet LAN (LAN S
erver also supports the broadband-based PC Network adapters). With the LAN Server for Macintosh option, Apple Macintosh computers on an AppleTalk network can access server machines on an IBM OS/2 LAN Server network and exchange System 7.0 files with DOS and OS/2 files.
IBM has made some major changes and additions to OS/2 LAN Server in version 4.0. The LAN Server administrative tools now use the object technology in the OS/2 Workplace Shell by representing all network resources as
OS/2 icons
. A user can be added to a group by simply picking up the icon and dropping it on the group. Administrators can manage multiple domains from any workstation, regardless of where the domain servers are located. To share server resources, the administrator just has to open a menu for the given object's icon to have the option of sharing, denying, and managing access rights, including printers, CD-ROM drives, and asynchronous resources. Public applications stored on the server can be allocated to a u
ser or a group by dropping the application on that icon. The command-line interface is still supported for all version 4.0 functions, however. The following are other key enhancements made to IBM OS/2 LAN Server 4.0:
-- LAN adapter detection
--To address third-party adapter support issues, LAN Server includes a detection facility to identify a machine's installed network adapter and the jumper and switch settings on the card.
-- Multiple domain browse
--LAN Server clients have always had the option of a single log-on into multiple domains, but version 4.0 allows for global resource availability (regardless of a user's native domain). These cross-domain links allow users to access the tools they need, regardless of where they log on. In addition, LAN Server's aliasing feature lets users reference network resources without knowing where they are located on the network.
-- Enforced disk-space limits
--Network administrators can now enforce disk-space
limitations on network users through the GUI or command-line interface.
-- Performance improvements
--OS/2 symmetric multiprocessing is supported in LAN Server 4.0; OS/2 and LAN Server support up to four processors. To exploit Pentium processors, version 4.0 supports native-mode operation in caching. Peer-to-peer support is now available for DOS, DOS/Windows, and OS/2 clients, and Microsoft's Windows for Workgroups and Windows NT clients can connect directly to LAN Server machines.
-- DOS enhancements
--LAN Server takes advantage of client-server caching to reduce the number of DOS clients' cross-network requests for data, resulting in reduced network traffic. The DOS client now ships with an optional GUI that enables point-and-click connection, peer messaging, application launching, and resource sharing.
-- Transport improvements
--LAN Server is implemented with OS/2's MPTS (Multi-Protocol Transport Services), which allows for integration into a num
ber of networking environments. On the protocol side, it includes full TCP/IP support, and a new version of the NetBIOS API for TCP/IP that is faster than before. Also, NetBIOS caching has been added to the OS/2 NetBIOS over the TCP/IP component.
As in version 3.0, the latest IBM NOS offering comes in two packaged versions: OS/2 LAN Server Entry and OS/2 LAN Server Advanced. LAN Server Advanced differs from LAN Server Entry on three key capabilities and functions that are available only on the high-end product: 386 HPFS (High-Performance File-System) support, fault tolerance for fixed disks (to support disk mirroring and disk duplexing), and local security support for the 386 HPFS partitions.
Microsoft Windows NT Server 3.5
With the release of Windows NT 3.5, Microsoft is shipping two distinct products, Windows NT Workstation and Windows NT Server. Windows NT Workstation is optimized to provide a high level of interactive application responsiveness, while Windows NT Serv
er provides optimized network responsiveness. Specific workstation optimization measures include overall reduction of memory usage, higher system priorities for foreground (i.e., interactive) applications, and improved efficiency of both 16- and 32-bit desktop application operations. Similarly, specific optimizations for the server include better memory usage to cache large amounts of data, higher system priority for network users, and improved efficiency of 32-bit server application operations.
Microsoft Windows NT Server 3.5 is a hardware-independent NOS that runs on systems with Intel 80x86, RISC, and Digital Equipment Alpha processors. It is scalable to symmetric multiprocessing systems, where users can add extra processors for greater performance. Its 32-bit flat memory model does away with 64-KB memory segments and DOS's 640-KB barrier. The NOS has multiple threads of execution, allowing applications to be more powerful, but memory protection assures stability by providing applications with separ
ate memory spaces to prevent data corruption. NT Server's preemptive multitasking also lets the NOS allocate to each application efficiently.
Microsoft has made several major improvements to NT Advanced Server 3.1, introduced in the summer of 1993, after it failed to steal any significant portion of NetWare's NOS market. NT Server 3.5 is 4 MB to 6 MB smaller than version 3.1, has 200 percent better file-server performance (according to Microsoft), and has improved connectivity. Microsoft completely rewrote the TCP/IP stack, making it faster and smaller, and added two services that make TCP/IP much easier to administer.
The DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Program) assigns IP addresses dynamically from a centrally managed pool of addresses. This relieves network administrators of the burden of assigning IP addresses to individual workstations and maintaining those addresses. WINS (Windows Internet Naming Service) maps computer names to IP addresses, allowing a user to refer to a machine by a use
r-specified (and easily recognizable) name, rather than by its cryptic address code.
Microsoft has increased support for NetWare in version 3.5 by including a GateWay Service for NetWare that allows users access to NetWare servers without running dual stacks at the client. A migration tool for NetWare aids network administrators by copying user accounts and files from NetWare servers to a Windows NT Server system while maintaining security. Other improvements include support for long filenames beyond the 8.3 naming restriction, TCP/IP printing, account lockout for too many incorrect password attempts, and administration tools for 16-bit Windows applications.
These highlighted improvements are most evident when NT Server is used with the preferred client--Windows for Workgroups. Windows for Workgroups 3.11 supports 32-bit protected-mode network components (32-bit network protocols such as NetBEUI and an IPX/SPX-compatible transport, as well as a 32-bit network redirector) to communicate with Wind
ows NT Server. With an NDIS 3 network-card driver, the system provides a 32-bit code path from the network card to the network redirector, resulting in even greater performance improvement over a real-mode redirector, while consuming only 4 KB of conventional memory.
Windows for Workgroups 3.11 also supports client-side cache. A new feature in Windows for Workgroups 3.11 called 32-bit File Access provides a 32-bit protected-mode replacement for the MS-DOS-based SmartDrive disk-cache program. 32-bit File Access caching routines are implemented as 32-bit protected-mode code, thus reducing the need to transition to real mode to cache disk information. 32-bit File Access read-ahead routines work on a per-file basis rather than on a per-sector basis, resulting in a higher probability that information read into the disk cache will be used. And 32-bit File Access caching routines share cache memory with the protected-mode network redirector (VREDIR.386), thus reducing the memory overhead for maintaining mult
iple cache buffers.
Novell NetWare 3.12 and 4.02
Although Novell is preparing to release the next major upgrade, NetWare 4.1, NetWare 3.11 and 3.12 continue to be very popular NOS products, maintaining their market leadership. By the time you read this, NetWare 4.1 should be available.
When introduced in 1993, Novell's top-of-the-line product incorporated several key features. Topping the list of new network services is NDS (NetWare Directory Services), a distributed database of network-wide information that replaces the NetWare 3.xx flat-file bindery. Designed along the general outlines of the X.500 international directory services standard, Novell's NDS aggregates names and associated information for every object on the network (including users, groups, servers, printers, server volumes, and other network services) into a common NDS database. Because NDS is a single, logical database, it allows users to log in to the network once, with only one authentication, and provid
es them access to all authorized network resources and services.
NetWare Directory Services views all network resources and physical entities as objects in a distributed database known as the NetWare Directory Database. An NDS object consists of categories of information known as properties and the data or value about those properties. NDS operates in a hierarchical organization known as the directory tree. The directory tree is made up of two types of objects: container objects and leaf objects. The hierarchical directory tree starts with a root object and branches out in a multitier organization, adding other container objects at each level, and ends with leaf objects. While container objects can hold other container objects (parent objects), leaf objects do not contain other objects. They generally represent users, computers, printers, and lists. The installation program creates the root object and places it at the top of the directory hierarchy. It cannot be deleted.
Security is an important
element of the NetWare environment. Its implementation can be made as centralized or as dispersed as desired. The four levels of security in NetWare--NDS security, file-system security, server security, and log-in and password security--can be used separately or in any combination to ensure effective access management and control. After the log-in and password security check has authenticated a user and grants access to the network, the remaining three security provisions can control the user's further access to network resources and services.
Server security attempts to limit or prevent server-console access, while NDS security (through either object or property rights, or both) controls a trustee's rights to NDS objects and information stored within objects. File-system security controls access to NetWare volumes, directories, and individual files through Rights security and Attributes security. Rights security controls what a user can do to directories and files, while Attributes security assigns s
pecific access-control characteristics to prevent tasks that effective rights would allow. For example, Attributes can be used to prevent anyone who has full access to a specific directory from deleting directories and/or files. Controlling access to the directory tree can be approached either from the natural hierarchical structure of the tree, in which rights flow top-down, or through an IRF (Inherited Rights Filter), in which access rights of a parent object are blocked from flowing down to the child object, thereby controlling access at any level of the directory tree. Among the four kinds of access rights that exist in NetWare (object, property, directory, and file), only object and property rights apply to NDS objects. Directory and file rights apply, as in previous versions of NetWare, to controlling access to the file system.
The Enterprise Option
Windows NT Server's excellent performance, ease of use, and ease of learning features, combined with its excellent networking,
make it a strong candidate for many network environments. Organizations with client-server application models would also find Windows NT Server a very good network platform, since that is its strength. Installations considering the Microsoft Windows NT and Windows for Workgroups operating systems for their desktops will find Windows NT Server the ideal network environment for centralized management, security, and fault-tolerant support.
For large installations planning to implement an enterprise network infrastructure, Novell's NetWare 4.02 is a logical choice. Excellent multiplatform support, very good performance, a proven network foundation, a powerful global directory service, and an expanding base of connectivity options make NetWare 4.02 a powerful candidate for large interconnected networks with multiple bridged servers.
About the Products
OS/2 LAN Server 4.0
First server, $795; each additional server license, $715; OS/2 LAN Server 4.0 Advanced, $2,295
(each additional license, $2180); OS/2 LAN Server-Entry Upgrade, $395 (each additional license $315); OS/2 LAN Server Advanced Upgrade, $495 (each additional license $415); Requester, $50 ($500-$2250, 10-50 clients)
IBM Corp.
Old Orchard Road
Armonk, NY 10504
(800) IBM-2468
Contact local branch or dealer.
Windows NT, Version 3.5
Server, $699; Windows NT Server 3.5 MLP, $599; Windows NT 3.5 (single-user client license), $39.95; Windows NT 3.5 (20-user client license), $569; upgrade from 3.1 Advanced Server, $699; upgrade from 3.1 Advanced Server MLP, $599
Microsoft Corp.
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98073-9717
(206) 882-8080
NetWare, Version 3.12
Server and client software: 20 users, $3495;
100 uses, $6995; 250 users, $12,495
NetWare, Version 4.02
Server and client software: five users, $1395;
10 users, $3195; 25 users, $4695; 50 users, $6295; 100 users, $8795; 250 uses, $15,695; 500 users, $26,395; 1000 users, $47,995
Novell, Inc.
Overview
NSTL
RATING VERSION PERFORMANCE VERSATILITY
**** Microsoft Windows NT Server 3.5 X X
**** Novell NetWare 4.02 X X
*** Novell NetWare 3.12 O X
*** IBM OS/2 LAN Server 4.0 O X
NSTL EASE OF EASE OF PRICE
RATING VERSION USE LEARNING (10 USERS)
**** Microsoft Windows NT Serv
er 3.5 X X $1099
**** Novell NetWare 4.02 X X $3195
*** Novell NetWare 3.12 X X $2495
*** IBM OS/2 LAN Server 4.0 X X $2795
KEY
***** Outstanding X Good
**** Excellent O Fair
*** Average XX Unacceptable
** Below average
* Poor
Novell's NetWare version 4.1
Novell's recently released NetWare version 4.1 offers the
following new features:
-- More robust directory services, including tools for cutting, pasting,
and merging directory trees and renaming containers.
-- NetSynch synchronizes with NetWare 3.x networks. You can update
NetWare 3.x servers from a NetWare 4.x server transparently.
-- NetWare for OS/2 runs NetWare 4.x on top of OS/2 as a nondedicated server.
-- Full NetWare support for Macintosh.
-- A single point of administration fo
r a user network ID and mail ID
(mail is integrated into the NetWare directory).
-- Smaller, 200-KB messaging engine integrates and uses a common directory
(requires 6.5 MB on the back end).
-- Price equal to that of NetWare 3.x. SFT3 integrated into the product.
Licensing cost reduced from $11,000 to $1495 for 100 users or less
and $3995 for 100 users or more.
-- NLSP and NetWare/IP wide-area protocols.
-- Includes French, Italian, German, and Spanish languages. Versions in
Korean, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Japanese, and Portuguese
scheduled for release in August.
-- Simplified installation only requires entering company name, password,
and time zone when installing single-server networks.
See this month's cover story by Jon Udell for an examination of
Novell products and market forecast.
Highlights
OS/2 Lan Server 4.0
Strengths
-- Uses high-performance 32-bit 386 HPFS
-- Domain-based naming system
-- Remote
server management
-- Full electronic documentation facility
Limitations
-- Does not support global naming of all network objects
-- Users require multiple log-on IDs across domains
-- No system or group log-on scripts
-- Workstation installations are time consuming
Windows NT Server 3.5
Strengths
-- Domain-based naming system
-- Memory protection and preemptive scheduling
-- Symmetric multiprocessing support
-- Remote server management
Limitations
-- Does not support global naming (multidomain) of all network objects
-- Requires primary-domain controller
-- No system or group log-on scripts
-- Limited wide-area connectivity options
Novell Netware 3.12
Strengths
-- Simple workstation installation and fast shell updating
-- Good multiple-environment client support
-- Excellent remote management features
-- Workgroup administrators
Limitations
-- Lack of memory protection and preemptive scheduling
-- Does not support global naming of all network o
bjects
-- Users require multiple log-on IDs for individual servers
-- Does not support sliding window transport protocol
Novell Netware 4.02
Strengths
-- Feature-rich global network directory and naming service database
-- Extensive client support
-- Supports internal bridging/routing
-- ODI multiprotocol workstation support
-- Very good fault-tolerant features, including Transaction Tracking System
Limitations
-- Complex directory tree setup
-- New server console interface adds to the learning curve
-- Some gaps in completeness of printed documentation set
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With the object technology of the Workplace Shell, LAN Server 4.0 now represents all network resources as OS/2 icons.
Platforms And Protocols
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Security And Management
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Backup And Application Support
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Networks for the Enterprise
