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This appears to have been the original DOS client for NetWare up to and including NetWare 3.11. It was replaced with the VLM Client in NetWare 3.12 and 4.0.
The NetWare 3.11 Installation Manual puts the system requirements as:
Its possible earlier (and later) versions of this client have different hardware requirements. The version distributed with NetWare 2.15 at least supported DOS 2.x and there are hints in NSEPro that a client supported DOS 1.x at one point too.
I've tested v3.02 with ODI drives on an emulated IBM PC (8088) with 256K of RAM running MS-DOS 3.21 and it seems to work fine. The NetWare 4.11 version of login.exe is too large for this amount of ram so attaching to a NetWare 3.12 server was required in order to login. This can be forced by setting the preferred server in shell.cfg.
The DOS Workstation Shell originally used packet drivers supplied as object files (.obj, .lan). These had to be linked with IPX.OBJ to produce a monolithic IPX.COM customised for the workstations NIC. If you changed your network card or its configuration (IRQ, etc), you had to relink your driver with ipx.obj to make a new version of ipx.com.
The link step is done by the WSGEN or SHGEN utility and is pretty easy - it just asks you to pick a driver and configure it (IRQ, etc) then spits out a custom IPX.COM for that network board and configuration.
Once you've got your special IPX.COM you start the client by running IPX.COM followed by NETx.COM where x is a number (3 for DOS 3.x, 4.x for DOS4, 5.0). Configuration can be supplied to the shell via a shell.cfg file.
If you want to see what building IPX.COM using WSGEN or SHGEN looks like, I've got a bunch of screenshots of the process.
Sometime in 1990 Novell novell switched their focus to ODI drivers. These do away with linking object files - instead you configure them via NET.CFG in the same way as with the later VLM drivers. You start the client by running LSL.COM followed by your driver (eg 3C503.COM), followed by IPXODI.COM and then the appropriate shell for your version of DOS (eg, NET3.COM).
Its possbile the monolithic IPX.COM uses less memory than ODI but if you can use it ODI is the easier option.
If the client successfully attaches to a server but you don't get an F drive (or any other network drive) mapped to SYS:LOGIN check your config.sys. LASTDRIVE=Z leaves no drive letters free for NETX to use.
Only a very brief change summary is included here. For more details on versions 3.01 Rev. A through 3.32 ptf see the history file distributed with DOSUP8.
The DOSUP files are, as the name may imply, just updates - not a full client distribution. If you combine all of the DOSUP files you get something fairly close to the DOS/ODI Workstation Services Disk that came with NetWare 3.11. The files that are missing (full list here) look to be mostly (if not entirely) to do with the old IPX.COM driver model. Everyting you need to use packet drivers (LSL.COM, IPXODI.COM, NETX.EXE) is available from one of these files.
If you want to use IPX.COM and old-style packet drivers you'll want to start off with the full 3.01 client kit (which provides SHGEN) and apply updates as necessary from there.
Some of the readme files linked from here have a .DOC file extension. These are actually ASCII text files. You can open them in Notepad just fine.
| Version | Date | Notes | Links |
| 3.32 ptf | 22 November 1994 | The version is still reported as 3.32 PTF but it has a 941122 date. It has been updated to support all versions of DOS 7.x and below (presumably only down to DOS 3.0 as with previous versions). | NET33X.EXE, Readme |
| 3.32 ptf | 24 June 1993 | Misc bug fixes. | DOSUP8.ZIP, Readme |
| 3.32 | 17 February 1993 | Support for DOS versions 3.0 through 6.0 | DOSUP7.ZIP, Readme |
| 3.31 | 12 November 1992 | NCP packet Signature security enhancement for NetWare 3.11 | DOSUP6.ZIP, Readme |
| 3.30 | Not Released | SFT Level III, NetWare v4.0 (attach only, no NDS functionality). NETX and BNETX are now .EXE files making it easier to load them high. | |
| 3.26 | 11 February 1992 | Packet Burst support (BNETX.COM). DOSUP5 replaces DOSUP4 and ODIUP5 | DOSUP5.ZIP, Readme |
| 3.22 | 31 July 1991 | Fix problem with remote boot and DOS 5.0. | DOSUP4.ZIP, Readme |
| 3.21 | 18 July 1991 | Generic shell. NET3.COM, NET4.COM and NET5.COM are replaced with NETX.COM. Same change for XMSNETx.EXE and EMSNETx.EXE. | |
| 3.10 | 7 March 1991 | Includes new NET5.COM, XMSNET5.EXE and EMSNET5.EXE files that work with DOS 5.0 | |
| 3.02 | 6 February 1991 | Misc bug fixes and enhancements. Add DOS NAME=name Net.CFG parameter. |
DOSUP1.ZIP,
Readme WINUP1.ZIP SHL302.ZIP - probably superseded by DOSUP1.ZIP |
| 3.01 Rev. E | 27 November 1990 | Add version.exe utility, /? command line option and other misc bug fixes and enhancements. | SH301E.ZIP, Readme |
| 3.01 Rev. D | 18 September 1990 | Fix problem with programs run from NetWare 2.x login scripts. When initially released on 7 September 1990 NVER incorrectly reported Rev C instead of Rev D resulting in a corrected re-release on 18 September 1990. | DSWIND.ZIP |
| 3.01 Rev. C | Not Released | Made available only to NetWare developers. Fixed a number of misc bugs. | |
| 3.01 Rev. B | 6 June 1990 | Corrected a problem where loading SiteLock by Brightworks would crash the workstation. | |
| 3.01 Rev. A | 8 May 1990 | This the full NetWare DOS Client Kit v3.01 which was made publicly available via Compuserve and ftp.novell.com. See DSWIN0.TXT for kit contents. |
Readme DSWIN0.ZIP, DSWIN0.TXT, DSWIN1.ZIP, DSWIN2.ZIP, DSWIN3.ZIP, DSWIN4.ZIP |
| 3.01 Beta 11 | Parts of 3.01 Beta 11 were included with Windows 3.0 Release Candidate 12 (22 March 1990): net4.com, net3.com, ipx.obj, netbios.exe, login.exe, bindfix.exe, makeuser.{exe,hlp}, map.exe |
These are updates for (and in some cases perhaps the full distribution of) NetWare Workstation for Windows. This is the windows side of the NetWare client and includes windows utilities (popup, tools, etc) and drivers.
| Driver Set Version | Date | Notes | Links |
| 2.02 | 4 November 1993 | This is the final driver set supporting DOS Workstation Shell - subsequent versions require the VLM client. | WINUP8.ZIP, Readme |
| 2.02 | 8 December 1992 | Contains updated Windows client files. | WINUP7.ZIP, Readme |
| 2.0 | 17 April 1992 | Contains selected Windows client files from the NetWare Workstation Kit for DOS/Windows v2.0. | WINUP6.ZIP, Readme |
| 1.03 | 3 March 1992 | This file contains the NetWare Driver Set v1.03 for Windows 3.0. Looks to be a full distribution including install program and manual. | WINUP5.ZIP, Readme |
| 1.03 | 15 January 1992 | This file contains the NetWare Driver Set v1.03 for Windows 3.0. Looks to be a full distribution including install program and manual. | WINUP4.ZIP, Readme |
| N/A | 25 November 1991 | This zip file contains the final released version of the NOVELL Windows IPX/SPX Driver Set. | VIPX.ZIP, Readme |
| 1.03 | 21 June 1991 | NetWare Workstation for Windows. Looks to be a full distribution including install program and manual. | WINUP2.ZIP, Readme |
| 1.02 | 29 March 1991 | NetWare Windows Workstation Services for Windows 3.0. Includes an install program. | WINUP1.ZIP |
The table below shows when updates were released relative to each other. Clearly the three components (DOS Shell, Windows drivers & tools, ODI drivers) were not all on the same release schedule. Seems Novell just released an update for a component whenever there was a fix ready to go.
| Date | DOS Update | Windows Update | ODI Update |
| 1994 December 19 | NET33X.EXE | ||
| 1993 December 28 | DOSUP9.ZIP | ||
| 1993 December 27 | WINUP9.ZIP | ||
| 1993 November 4 | DOSUP8.ZIP | WINUP8.ZIP | |
| 1993 April 8 | DOSUP7.ZIP | ||
| 1992 December 11 | DOSUP6.ZIP | ||
| 1992 December 8 | WINUP7.ZIP | ||
| 1992 April 17 | WINUP6.ZIP | ||
| 1992 APril 16 | DOSUP5.ZIP | ||
| 1992 March 3 | WINUP5.ZIP | ||
| 1992 February 26 | ODIUP5.ZIP | ||
| 1992 January 15 | WINUP4.ZIP | ||
| 1991 December 13 | DOSUP4.ZIP | ||
| 1991 December 6 | ODIUP4.ZIP | ||
| 1991 November 25 | VIPX.ZIP | ||
| 1991 August 1 | ODIUP2.ZIP | ||
| 1991 July 30 | DOSUP3.ZIP | ||
| 1991 June 21 | WINUP2.ZIP | ||
| 1991 April 4 | DOSUP1.ZIP | ||
| 1991 March 29 | WINUP1.ZIP | ||
| 1990 December 11 | SH301E.ZIP | ||
| 1990 September 28 | ODIDOS.ZIP | ||
| 1990 May 22 | DSWIN*.ZIP | ||
The following updates are known to have existed (based on usenet posts and references in NSEPro) but can not be located:
I'm not a netware expert, don't have any of those fancy novell certifications and have never administred a netware network; I've just played with it at home occasionally since 2004 or so. Email me if you've got any suggestsions or corrections for this page or any extra information you think is worth including here. My address is david at this websites domain name (without the www bit of course).