Getting Started, Documentation, Tips & Tricks

I'm having trouble getting on the internet with my P.I. running Irix 5.3.
I already have set the nameserver in the /etc/resolve.conf but to no effect.
When I run netscape to let's say http://www.sgi.com I get the "Server not found" error massage

I can see all the other SGI's on my network and visaversa, NIS also works on the P.I.

I just hope I don't have to install any patches they tend to mess up the System.
Specially on Irix 5.3.

Any Irix 5.3 specialists out there ?

Probably static route again.

IRIX 6.x has this in /etc/config/static-route.options but i suspect that IRIX 5.3 has it in /etc/init/network. Read through that file to see if there is some reference of static routes. When in doubt, use the gui!

Yes, set up a static route in /etc/rc2.d/S30network and nameservers in /etc/resolv.conf manually, here's a good walkthrough:

http://software.majix.org/irix/network-setup.shtml

I have tried both pointers to get my P.I. on the internet, but still no luck so far.
I've installed a complete new system some time ago and since then I had no luck getting it on the net.
I can see my network
What used to be a simple edit in the doesn't work anymore.

Do I need to install some patches, I really don't want to cause when I installed the
P.I. Patchset last time, it messed up my motif colors when overlapping windows...
I've installed a clean Irix 5.3 with XFS.

try this

http://jamesthornton.com/writing/irix-c ... howto.html

O.K. Static route seems to work just fine.
During startup it say's that static route does see a gateway host.

Even Netscape thinks it can do business with the world wide web.
But after wanting to go to http://www.sgi.com it tries to connect
for about a minute and then an error massage pops up saying
"Invalid argument".

Does anyone know what is wrong here?

Do some basic tests and let us know the results:

Ping your router by IP Address

Ping your ISPs gateway by IP Address

Ping your ISPs nameservers by IP Address

Ping some external website by IP Address

Repeat the above by pinging by hostname

Also what are your internal network settings ? IP addresses, default gateway, netmask etc.

rothers wrote: Do some basic tests and let us know the results:

Ping your router by IP Address

Was succesful !

rothers wrote: Ping your ISPs gateway by IP Address

Was succesful !

rothers wrote: Ping your ISPs nameservers by IP Address

Was succesful !

rothers wrote: Ping some external website by IP Address

Not succesful !
Netscape now complains:

It shows this message with all the sites I tried to contact!

rothers wrote: Also what are your internal network settings ? IP addresses, default gateway, netmask etc.

Its just a good working network with a router/switcher.
I have several other SGI's and an Apple G3 hooked up to the internet with no problems what
so ever..........

I must ad to this that the machine in question, my P.I, is the only one with Irix 5.3!
The rest of my SGI's are all running 6.5.

This could be an issue here....

a humble bump here

irix 5.3 seems to be mocking me. first the netmask from /etc/config/ifconfig-1.options is simply ignored and as soon as i set it manually (ifconfig ec0 netmask 0xffff0000) it shows up but the network is dead
hence setting the default route doesn't work either and gives me a nice errno 128. it's the 5.3 with xfs release and i installed a crapload of patches

all of that with that same machine (indigo2, r4400, elan) works fine under 6.2 so i assume the hardware, cables etc. are alright.

somehow i think it's my fault but i don't know why. the same happened to me with irix 4. as soon as i change the netmask to something wider like 0xffff0000 the network is dead.
it's like that, for properly using my network i need to be a bit more flexible i.e. need to access 192.168.3.x but also 192.168.44.x for example.

not a problem with 6.2 nor 6.5 but 5.3 and older have the mentioned issues. did i miss something?

The network stack in IRIX 4 and perhaps 5 is probably still class-based - pre-CIDR, pre-variable netmask. (If somebody isn't sure what I mean, see Classful networking ) So the network stack may be rejecting a 16-bit netmask for a network number it "knows" requires a 24-bit netmask, or simply fails to work with it.

A class-aware stack should allow subnetting a Class B or Class A network, rather than trying to treat Class C networks as a Class B. But I don't imagine renumbering all your equipment to suit one or two machines is all that appealing...

hmm techpubs for 5.3 say:

The nonsubnetted netmask for a Class B address (in hexadecimal) would be 0xffff0000

seems this works in a limited way. if the gateway is on the same net as the local ip then a wider netmask works, too. otherwise it is as described above