NFS

[Hwa Jin Bae]

There's been good discussions regarding the protocol independence
of NFS design, however let me start a new discussion on
possible new NFS implementation strategies.
Since I haven't had the pleasure of reading SUN's NFS implementation
source codes, I have a few questions regarding possible implementation
of a NFS system as a user process.  The RFC pretty much does a
good job of describing the NFS protocols but it is not explicitly
indicated how you would go about implementing the client side exactly -
I guess it will have to be implemented as modifications to kernel much
like the RFS (public domain implementation of a remote file system, not
to be confused by the better known RFS - remote file sharing - by AT&T),
which doesn't use the mount points like NFS but uses a file that gets
used by namei() routine in the kernel to distinguish remote filesystems
from local filesystems.  The server side would be relatively easy to
implement as a user level process by just following the protocol specification
(of which a good rpcgen input file exists with latest RPC package from SUN)
and implementing various services.  Does anyone have a good idea as to
how one would go about implementing the client as a user level process and
still meet the same NFS specifications on a UNIX system?  The reason
for trying to implement everything is for portability.  In particular,
I am interested in knowing how PC-NFS (client only, right?) is implemented.
Is it implemented as a modification to the MS-DOS kernel?
I'm very curious...


Hwa Jin Bae          | I only work for LLNL and CDC; they are not responsible
Control Data Corp.   | for my personal opinions.
4234 Hacienda Drive  | bae@{ati,aftac,vega}.tis.llnl.gov   (Internet)
Pleasanton, CA 94566 | {ames,ihnp4,lll-crg}!lll-tis!bae    (UUCP)