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ZanNet Manual (Beta 1)
by Zan Software
Table of Contents
1 Copyright/License/Warranty Information…………………………. 2
License Agreement………………………………………… 2
Evaluation and Registration……………………………….. 2
Distribution………………………………………………… 2
Registered Version…………………………………………. 2
Governing Law…………………………………………….. 2
Disclaimer of Warranty…………………………………….. 3
2 About ZanNet - What is it?………………………………………… 3
3 Operating System and Software Requirements……………………. 4
4 Installation and Setup……………………………………………… 4
The Windows 95 Network Client…………………………. 4
The Unix Server…………………………………………… 4
Configuring Your Telnet Login Script……………………. 6
The Setup Dialog………………………………………….. 7
Logging In…………………………………………………. 8
5 Unix Porting and Compatibility……………………………………. 9
6 Known Limitations, Problems, and Other Notes………………….. 9
7 Performance Considerations……………………………………….. 12
The Status Dialog…………………………………………. 12
Killing I/O…………………………………………………. 13
Killing I/O with the Hot-key………………………. 13
Killing I/O with the ZanNet Status Dialog Buttons..
13
8 Ordering Information……………………………………………… 14
Entering Your Registration Key…………………………… 14
9 Product Support …………………..………………………………. 14
10 Zan Software Contact Information………………………………… 15
1. Copyright/License/Warranty
ZanNet, Copyright 1996-1997 by Zan Software
All Rights Reserved.
License Agreement
Please read the following terms and conditions before using this software.
Your use of this software indicates your acceptance of this license
agreement and warranty.
Evaluation and Registration
This is not free software. You are hereby licensed to use this software
for evaluation purposes without charge for a period of 30 days. If you use
this software after the 30 day evaluation period a registration fee of $95
is required. Payments must be in US dollars drawn on a US bank, and should
be sent to Zan Software, 332 SE 7th Ave, Delray Beach, FL, 33483. Credit
card ordering through e-mail and fax, in addition to quantity discounts are
available, as described in the included file: order.doc. All orders must
include this form.
Unregistered use of ZanNet after the 30-day evaluation period is in
violation of U.S. and international copyright laws.
Distribution
You are hereby licensed to make as many copies of the trial version of this
software and documentation as you wish; give exact copies of the original
trial version to anyone; and distribute the trial version of the software
and documentation in its unmodified form via electronic means. There is no
charge for any of the above.
You are specifically prohibited from charging, or requesting donations, for
any such copies, however made; and from distributing the software and/or
documentation with other products (commercial or otherwise) without prior
written permission.
Registered Version
One registered copy of ZanNet may either be used by a single person who
uses the software personally on one or more computers, or installed on a
single workstation used non-simultaneously by multiple people, but not
both.
Governing Law
This agreement shall be governed by the laws of the State of Florida.
Disclaimer of Warranty
THIS SOFTWARE AND THE ACCOMPANYING FILES ARE SOLD "AS IS" AND WITHOUT
WARRANTIES AS TO PERFORMANCE OF MERCHANTABILITY OR ANY OTHER WARRANTIES
WHETHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED.
Good data processing procedure dictates that any program be thoroughly
tested with non-critical data before relying on it. The user must assume
the entire risk of using the program. ANY LIABILITY OF THE SELLER WILL BE
LIMITED EXCLUSIVELY TO PRODUCT REPLACEMENT OR REFUND OF PURCHASE PRICE.
2. About ZanNet - What is it?
ZanNet is a Windows 95 network client and Unix server that provide you with
a Windows 95 network drive to access your server files. The product
includes network provider and redirector for Windows 95 in addition to a
Unix server. The server portion ships with both POSIX compliant source code
and binary support for select Unix platforms. ZanNet is intended to replace
both File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and Telnet programs currently used to
access web page and other files through an Internet Service Provider (ISP).
Windows to Unix networking is not new. There are a number of solutions
including the Network File System (NFS) and Samba. Unfortunately, with
todayΓÇÖs fledgling Internet service market, very few service providers are
willing or able to give their customers access to these servers. In most
cases, Windows users that want to manage a web page must do so using both
FTP and Telnet. With ZanNet, you can get the functionality of a Windows
network drive without requiring any configuration on the part of your
service provider. Additionally, the ZanNet client is designed to handle
slow or dead servers by allowing you to stop network I/O at any time
through both hot-key sequences and control buttons. This feature is
extremely important for applications that have the potential to lock-up
Windows while waiting for network I/O (for example the Windows Explorer).
To use ZanNet you must have Windows 95, MicrosoftΓÇÖs TCP/IP Protocol,
WinSock, a Unix style shell account, and an Internet connection. The ZanNet
client is installed in the same fashion as any other network client (see
installation instructions later for details). Once the client is installed,
you must install the server portion by uploading either the source or
binary files depending on whether binaries for your version of Unix are
included. When both client and server are ready, you need to modify the
Telnet login script so the ZanNet client can login to the Unix machine and
execute the ZanNet server. Once the server is started, it will open a
connection back to your Windows machine through a TCP/IP port that you can
define in the client configuration. The ZanNet client uses WinSock to
establish a control connection through Telnet to the server while regular
file system requests are handled at the Windows driver level directly
through the Microsoft TCP/IP stack.
Once ZanNet is set up, you can configure it so that Windows automatically
maps a network drive to your Unix shell account whenever you establish a
connection to the Internet. Then, manage your web files through whatever
Windows utility or application you like. Be sure to read sections 6: Known
limitations and problems and 7: Performance Considerations for notes on
using ZanNet.
3. Operating System and Software Requirements
The ZanNet software package consists of a Windows 95 client and Unix
server. Source code for the server portion is also included, allowing ports
to various Unix platforms. Because that source code is POSIX compliant,
other operating systems supporting the POSIX standard may be compatible
with ZanNet source code.
For the client side, you will need:
ΓÇó Windows 95.
ΓÇó WinSock running on MicrosoftΓÇÖs TCP/IP Protocol.
ΓÇó An established Internet connection.
In most cases, ZanNet will NOT work with other TCP/IP stacks from vendors
other than Microsoft. The ZanNet client interfaces with both WinSock and
MicrosoftΓÇÖs TCP/IP VxD Interface. Confused yet? As long as you are running
the TCP/IP protocol that came with Windows 95, you should be fine.
For the server side, you will need:
ΓÇó A Unix style shell account accessible over the Internet.
ΓÇó File Transfer Protocol (FTP) access to that account.
ΓÇó A ZanServer binary for your shell accountΓÇÖs operating system and
hardware platform OR C compiler access.
4. Installation and Setup
The Windows 95 Network Client
Before you begin installation of ZanNet, we assume you have Windows 95 with
a working Internet connection. Additionally, you should be running
MicrosoftΓÇÖs TCP/IP Protocol and MicrosoftΓÇÖs WinSock (both are shipped with
Windows 95). You can verify the protocol by checking the Control Panel |
Network dialog where you should see TCP/IP listed as an existing component.
To install the ZanNet client, click on the Add… button within that same
dialog and select Client as the type of network component you want to
install. Click on that dialog’s Add… button to get to the Select Network
Client dialog. Here, you need to click on the Have Disk… button where you
can click Browse… to get to where the ZanNet files are located. Once you
are in the directory where the uncompressed ZanNet files are, you should
see zannet.inf highlighted. Click on OK. Click on OK again in the following
Install From Disk dialog. Two more OKs are required on the next two dialogs
(Windows may require the installation disks after the final OK).
After rebooting your computer, look on the lower right hand corner of your
screen. If the ZanNet client was installed correctly, you should see a blue
ΓÇ£ZΓÇ¥. Seeing this tray icon indicates that both the ZanNet Network Provider
and Network Redirector were installed correctly and have been loaded. This
is also an indication that the redirector has found the proper version of
TCP/IP. If you get a load error such as ΓÇ£Can't load redirectorΓÇ¥, you may
not have the required version of TCP/IP.
The Unix Server
You can install the server once the client has been successfully installed.
The first thing you should do is verify your Unix operating system brand
(Linux, SunOS, etc.), version, and hardware platform (Intel, Sparkstation,
etc). ZanNet Beta 1 currently ships with the following Unix binaries:
zanserv.lnx -- Linux for Intel compiled with version 2.0.11
zanserv.sos -- SunOS for Sparkstation compiled with version 4.1.4
zanserv.bsd -- FreeBSD for Intel compiled with version 2.1-STABLE
zanserv.aix -- AIX for IBM RISC System/6000 compiled with version 4.1.4
By the time you are reading this, there may be more binary support. Just
check the included readme.txt file.
If you donΓÇÖt know what type of Unix your provider runs, login to your shell
account and type:
uname -a
Where you will get the Unix brand, machine name, operating system version,
and machine type. Check the man page on that command for your Unix
implementation to see how this information is ordered (man uname).
If ZanNet provides binary support for your Unix, simply upload the
appropriate binary to your shell account using FTP or similar tool. Once
the file is in your home directory, you will have to make it executable.
Something like this:
chmod 755 zanserv.sos
Then, just type in the name of the binary to verify that it will load on
that machine. You should get output similar to this:
unx% zanserv.sos
Usage: zanserv.sos <IP Address> <Port>
This machine's host name is: unx
This machine's IP address is: 204.91.67.111
If the binary does not load, you will get output like this:
zanserv.sos: Exec format error
That output indicates that the binary is not compatible with your Unix
platform. Make sure you have uploaded the correct binary. If you still
canΓÇÖt get it to load read the section on Unix porting and compatibility.
Configuring Your Telnet Login Script
Once you have the server installed correctly, you are ready to edit the
Telnet login script. The ZanNet client uses Telnet to automatically login
to your shell account and execute the server. You must edit the login
script so that the client can get through the login procedure of the Unix
machine. To begin editing this script, first double click on the blue ΓÇ£ZΓÇ¥
tray icon. That will bring up the ZanNet Setup dialog (discussed later).
YouΓÇÖll notice that the first edit field of that dialog contains the path
and file name of the login script. There is a default script called
zannet.lgn that is installed to your WindowΓÇÖs system directory. Click on
the Edit… button located on the right of the script name to bring up
Notepad and edit the script.
Looking at the scripting language, youΓÇÖll see that it is nothing
complicated. If the first character of a line starts with #, it is
considered a comment. Aside from that, there are a number of keywords that
start each line. Currently these are defined as:
ServerName -- The Telnet host name for the shell account. Multiple servers
are
permitted. Raw IP addresses are NOT supported.
HomeDirectory ΓÇô The directory you want the server to use as the root.
Default is your home directory.
MBDiskSpace ΓÇô Your disk space limit as defined by your service provider.
Default is 5 megabytes.
SendString -- A string sent after waiting a specified time to the Telnet
session. There are pre-defined variables for use with the send string. A
SendString can take up to six parameters. They are:
1. Wait String -- The string to wait for before sending the send string.
2. Timeout -- Number of seconds to wait.
3. Send String -- The string to send after finding the wait string.
4. Parm1 -- First parameter for the send string.
5. Parm2 -- Second parameter for the send string.
6. Parm3 -- Third parameter for the send string.
There are a number of special replacement variables that are used in a send
string. All of these variables begin with a $ and are defined as:
$Username -- Your user name as defined in the login dialog.
$Password -- The password for that user name from the login dialog.
$LocalIP -- The Windows 95 client IP address as determined by the
client.
$LocalPort -- The Windows 95 port to use for ZanServer connections as
defined in the setup dialog.
$Enter -- A carriage return and line feed.
$Connected -- Required to acknowledge a ZanServer connection.
See the example login script for more information on how these are used.
The Setup Dialog
Going back to the setup dialog youΓÇÖll notice a number of configuration
options. Additionally, there is a Register… button for entering your
registration key if you have decided to buy the product. Here is a list of
configuration options followed by brief descriptions:
Login Script and Edit Button: Allow you to change both the path and file
name of your login script. The edit button brings up the Windows Notepad to
edit that script.
Debug Mode On: This check box brings up a Telnet window and turns on the
server debug messages. The Telnet window is useful for debugging your login
script. It can also be used as a simple line mode terminal if you type a
control-C to stop the server process. Make sure this is on for your first
login attempt.
Windows Port: If, for some reason, your Windows 95 implementation has a
conflict with the default port value of 23130, you can change the port to
any value between 5,000 and 65,535. It is doubtful that you will ever have
to change this value.
Keep Alive: Enabling this checkbox will cause the ZanNet client to send an
ΓÇ£Are You ThereΓÇ¥ message to the Telnet server every so often to keep that
connection from closing. This prevents providers from closing your Telnet
session due to lack of activity.
Max. Server readdirs for Disk Space: Sets a maximum number of files the
server will read to determine how much server disk space your home
directory and below is using. A value of 0 will disable disk space
calculation.
Stop I/O Hot-key: A hot-key sequence using the combination of the Ctrl and
Alt keys with another key to stop ZanNet I/O that has been pending for a
period of X seconds. A hot-key is required for cases when youΓÇÖd like to
abort I/O, but canΓÇÖt get to Windows because the Windows user interface is
waiting for a thread pending on ZanNet I/O. This hot-key will release those
threads pending with a network error. An error beep will sound if there are
no threads pending in the ZanNet redirector. (See page 13 Killing I/O).
Dead I/O in Seconds: A period of time in seconds where the ZanNet client
considers an I/O request to be dead for the purposes of the Stop I/O Hot-
key. This may be useful for users that have multiple ZanNet volumes and
donΓÇÖt want the hot-key to abort all ZanNet I/O, just I/O that is considered
dead. You may want to set this to zero for single volume usage. (See page
13 Killing I/O).
Default Server Security Attributes: Sets the default attributes that will
be used for file operations on the server side. Most web page files require
read/write privileges for the account owner (User) and read only access for
all others (Group and World). This is the default setup for ZanNet. DonΓÇÖt
change these unless you know what you are doing!
Logging In
After you have configured your login script and setup dialog, initiate a
login by mapping a new Windows Network Drive. You can map a drive by right
clicking on the My Computer desktop icon and selecting Map Network Drive.
Windows will bring up its Map Network Drive dialog with the next available
drive letter selected. In the Path edit field, you need to enter the
Universal Naming Convention (UNC) path that corresponds to your serverΓÇÖs
Telnet host name and the user name for your shell account. The Telnet name
should correspond to whatever you specified for your ServerName in the
login script. For example, if your Telnet host name is:
login.whatever.com
You would specify the following in the login script:
ServerName login.whatever.com
And then map the new network drive to the following UNC path:
\\login.whatever.com\myusername
Where, myusername is the user name for your shell account and
login.whatever.com is the Telnet hostname. Make sure you put double back
slashes before the host name and a single back slash before the user name.
The ZanNet client network provider will parse the UNC path and connect to
the host using WinSock. You will have an opportunity to enter a password
and may elect to cache that password. Once the connection has been
established, the tray icon will turn yellow. If the server successfully
connects back to your Windows machine, the tray icon will turn red.
5. Unix Porting and Compatibility
CanΓÇÖt get a ZanNet server binary for your Unix implementation? DonΓÇÖt worry,
itΓÇÖs a snap to compile the server. First thing to do is upload the files:
zanserv.c and zanserv.h to your shell account. This is extremely vanilla C
code written under the POSIX.1 standard. Once those files are uploaded type
in the following:
cc -o zanserv zanserv.c
The command prompt should return to you with not errors. If you got
something like this:
cc: Command not found.
That is bad news. Your service provider does not provide you with C
compiler access. In this case you must either beg your provider to compile
it for you, or get a ZanNet server binary from somewhere on the net. Some
compilers (most notably the gcc compiler) allow you to specify multiple
target machines. Perhaps you can find someone that will compile the source
for your target operating system and architecture.
Verify that your binary has compiled successfully by typing zanserv at the
command prompt see section 4 for the output you should get. DonΓÇÖt forget to
modify your login script to match the name of the server binary!
(Note to Unix Gurus: In order to keep the compilation simple and clean we
chose to keep all server code within a single C source file. Also, there is
no makefile either. Though some may consider this poor project management,
our design requires server simplicity both in source management and object
code.)
Known Limitations, Problems and Other Notes
The following section is a list a potential pitfalls you may encounter
while using ZanNet beta 1. Some of these will be fixed in future releases,
while others are design limitations. We compiled this list during our
development cycle for Beta 1. Many of the listed file system requests are
not supported for obvious reasons (for example direct disk I/O on a network
drive). We have listed all unsupported file system requests for
completeness.
No attempt is made to support older applications that use the 8.3 naming
standard. Applications that cannot handle long file names with see a
truncated version of any name over the 8.3 limitation and will fail if they
try to manipulate that truncated file name. If you MUST use an 8.3
applications, be sure to keep file names under the 8.3 limitation. The MS-
DOS Prompt included with Windows 95 works fine, but some DOS commands fail,
for example: DIR works, but DIR /S fails. We recommend using the Windows
Explorer.
The file system request: FS_SearchFile is not supported. This request
handles all older DOS find first and find next operations - the INT 21h
functions: 11h, 12h, 4Eh, and 4Fh. In some cases this may break older DOS
applications.
The file system request: FS_EnumerateHandle is not supported. This request
handles the Win32 function: GetFileInformationByHandle() and the DOS INT
21h functions: 440Dh, subfunction 086Dh. This function is documented by
Microsoft as an optional file system function. Any application the depends
on this function, though in error, may fail.
The file system request: FS_LockFile is not supported. This request handles
the Win32 functions: LockFile() and UnLockFile() and the DOS INT 21h
function: 5Ch. All file region lock requests currently return successfully.
This may break some applications (notably: Microsoft Access).
Overlapped I/O used by the Win32 functions: WriteFileEx() and ReadFileEx()
is not supported by the ZanNet file system requests: FS_ReadFile and
FS_WriteFile. Not many applications are using overlapped I/O, and none
should be dependent on it.
Because there is currently no file caching support for ZanNet, the file
system request: FS_CommitFile is not supported. This request handles the
Win32 function: FlushFileIOBuffers() and DOS INT 21h function: 68H. In
addition, the request FS_FlushVolume that handles DOS INT 21h 0Dh is not
supported.
The file system request: FS_MountVolume is not supported. Network drives
donΓÇÖt use this function.
The file system request: FS_Ioctl16Drive is not supported. This request
supports the DOS INT 21h function 44h. This will break older DOS
applications that try to perform direct disk I/O. Network drives donΓÇÖt
support this request.
The file system request: FS_DirectDiskIO is not supported. This request
supports the DOS INT 21h functions: 25h and 26h. This will break older DOS
applications that try to perform direct disk I/O. Network drives donΓÇÖt
support this request.
The file system request: FS_GetDiskParms is not supported. The ZanNet file
system driver does not maintain DPBs. This should not effect applications.
The Windows attributes: Archive, Hidden, and System are not supported.
While these attributes can be set without error, they will never be
reported. This could possibly break some applications.
The FindFirst must match attributes are not yet supported. This may break
some applications. Also, case sensitive file searches are not supported.
The directory entries ΓÇ£.ΓÇ¥ and ΓÇ£..ΓÇ¥ are never reported during a directory
listing. This may break some applications.
All files are opened fully read/write sharable (OF_SHARE_DENY_NONE).
Sharing flags will be ignored, but will return successfully. The user must
manually guard against problems with file sharing. I.e. donΓÇÖt open the same
file twice over ZanNet.
Because the current version of ZanNet provides no file caching or
buffering, some applications will run poorly. Most notably are file
compression software packages which tend to make extremely small file
system reads. Read section 7 Performance Considerations for more on this.
File size is limited to 4 gigabytes.
The disk usage report is approximate and may not exactly match statistics
reported from the Unix command du. Disk space remaining is calculated by
recursively traversing down the file tree starting from your home
directory. If your tree is very large you should disable this feature by
setting Max. Server readdirs for Diskspace to 0.
Raw IP addresses in dotted notation are not supported for Telnet logins.
Some service providers map Telnet host names to IP addresses on-the-fly
depending on system load. A Raw IP address, without a name lookup, would
break this model.
You cannot browse a ZanNet network through the Windows Network
Neighborhood. ZanNet does not really fit into this method of browsing. This
feature may be added in the future.
Command line NET commands such as NET USE are not supported and may cause
unpredictable results.
You cannot map multiple drive letters to a single shell account. You can,
however, map multiple drive letters to multiple, different shell accounts.
Some service providers do not allow multiple logins to a single shell
account through Telnet. With a provider such as this, a mapped ZanNet drive
will make it impossible for you to login with a regular Telnet program.
Simply disconnect the ZanNet drive to resolve this contention. You may also
break into the server program through the ZanNet server debug window with a
control-C and execute line mode commands. To restart the server, just log-
out of the Telnet session and the ZanNet client will re-establish the
connection.
The ZanNet server must be running on the same IP address that you Telnet in
to. In some rare cases, a provider may route your Telnet login to another
machine that does not match what the name server returned to the ZanNet
client.
Right mouse button click on .exe files results in many file system calls
and will respond very slowly on slow connections.
Basing your server to the Unix system root is very slow because all server
paths must be mapped to Windows paths. We suggest that you use the default
for best performance.
7. Performance Considerations
When you are using the ZanNet Beta, there are a number of things to kind in
mind. First of all, if you have never have experienced a network drive over
a slow connection such as a with a modem, you may find it very frustrating
to use this product. There is just no comparison between hard drive speeds
and modem speeds. Additionally, many applications are developed on, and
designed for hard drives, and or, high speed local area networks. Some such
applications use a ridiculous number of file system requests. For example,
we have seen a few that make sure the file is present (FindFirstFile()) for
every mouse click! Even though there is very little data transferred in
this scenario, just the ping time can cause a one second delay for that
mouse click. We leave it up to you to weed out any such applications. For
example, Windows Notepad works great for a quick update of HTML, while some
HTML specific editors get a little carried away with backup files, etc.
The Status Dialog
Another thing to keep in mind is buffer sizes. Try right mouse clicking on
the ZanNet tray icon. Select Status. That will bring up the ZanNet Status
dialog. Our network redirector posts status for file open, close, read, and
write to this dialog for all volumes. Here is a rundown on the fields of
the status dialog:
Server: The server name in UNC format (ex.
\\login.whatever.com\myusername).
File: The name of the file (ex. index.html).
Operation: What kind of operation just completed (ex. Write).
Buffer Size: The size of the data buffer for that operation (ex. 16384)
File Position: The current file position after that operation. (ex.
97792)
Speed: How much time in kilobytes per second that operation took (ex.
2.6k/sec).
Last Update: When the status was last updated (ex. 16:1:21)
For example, suppose you are extracting a file from a .ZIP archive and you
notice it is taking an incredibly long time. After pulling up the status
dialog, you see that the application is performing many tiny reads of less
than 20 bytes. The application is depending on file caching for good
performance. Unfortunately, ZanNet Beta 1 has no file caching, and is not
even pre-fetching data. Those little buffers are adding a HUGE overhead
because a read request must be sent to the server to fill each buffer. Our
recommendation here is to not use this application on ZanNet until we add
file caching in a future release.
Another Windows caveat to keep in mind has to do with the Windows Explorer.
For whatever reason, the Explorer seems to be single-threaded, and tunes
its buffer sizes to match the speed of your connection! That way, a very
poor connection may have 512 byte file copy buffers, while a better
connection may use 4096 byte buffers. Why do you care? The current ZanNet
design, to allow for simplicity in addition to random access, does not
stream data. Therefor, each read (or write) must be requested by the client
adding somewhere around the ping time for each read. For example, if it
takes ┬╝ of a second to reach a given server, that time is added as overhead
for each read buffer. Take a 100,000 byte file with Explorer using 4096
byte buffers. 100,000 divided by 4096 is around 24. Multiply that by ┬╝
seconds gives you an overhead of about 6 seconds. Not bad, but if you do
the math for a 10MB file using 512 bytes buffers, youΓÇÖll see why we think
this is a concern.
Also, know that the Explorer does a connection speed calculation before it
copies a file. Could be a problem if your connection is flaky during this
time. Our recommendation for these issues. For very large files that you
copy often, make a batch file and use a regular command line copy. That way
youΓÇÖll be using the ZanNet default buffer size of 16,384 bytes. For smaller
files, donΓÇÖt worry about it.
Killing I/O
We all are painfully aware by now that the Internet if far from perfect.
Most popular WinSock applications have some kind of stop button or other
mechanism to abort a file transfer. The ZanNet design required the same
functionality, but, because the ZanNet client is a network redirector
running as a VxD, a simple button would not suffice. Though you may not be
aware of it, there are many cases where Windows locks the user front-end
waiting for I/O (Explorer does this). Makes it kind of hard to click on a
button!
Killing I/O With the Hot-Key
We solved the I/O killing problem with a variety of techniques. The first,
and probably most powerful, is a hot-key sequence. This hot-key goes
directly to the ZanNet redirector VxD. The actual hot-key can be configured
in the ZanNet Setup. In that setup, youΓÇÖll notice something called: Dead
I/O in Seconds. When you hit the hot-key, the redirector goes through it
entire list of I/O requests for all ZanNet volumes. Each request that has
been waiting for a response for more than the dead I/O seconds value is
flagged as an ΓÇ£Unexpected Network ErrorΓÇ¥ and the application thread is
released with that error code set. You can set Dead I/O in Seconds to 0 to
make the redirector abort everything.
When the thread that requested ZanNet I/O returns, the application sees the
error and hopefully aborts I/O. Many times the application will request a
file close after the returned error in which case youΓÇÖll have to hit the
hot-key again. You may have to kill the application if it does not behave
properly. Of course, itΓÇÖs always best to disconnect the network drive for
problem servers if you can get to Windows.
Killing I/O with the ZanNet Status Dialog Buttons
The ZanNet status dialog contains two stop I/O buttons. The first called
Stop This FileΓÇÖs I/O will stop I/O (in the same way as the hot-key) for the
file listed in the status dialog only. This method is much less destructive
than the hot-key because it will only abort a given fill, not the every
pending request. Please note that you should always try to use whatever the
application provides for stopping a request first. For example, the
explorer has a Cancel button for file copies.
The other button in the status dialog is Stop All ZanNet I/O Now! This one
produces the same effect as a hot-key sequence with a 0 second dead I/O
value (see above). There is also a menu item on the tray icon called Abort
All Dead I/O which has the exact effect as the hot-key
8. Ordering Information
Current ordering methods are e-mail, regular mail, and fax. Payment options
are check, credit card, and purchase order ($500 minimum for purchase
order). All orders must include a properly filled out order form. This form
is contained in the enclosed file: order.doc. You may fill out the form on
your computer with an editor and send it electronically, or print it out
and hand write it for regular mail or fax. Multi-user pricing is included
in the order form.
Entering Your Registration Key
Your order will be processed within a 24 hour period after which time you
will receive a registration key. That key should be entered in the ZanNet
registration dialog. You can bring this dialog up with the ZanNet Setup |
Register button. Within that dialog, enter your first name, last name, and
the key supplied by Zan Software. Make sure you use the same first and
last name as supplied with your key.
9. Product Support
Initial contact for product support must be made through e-mail, fax, or
regular mail. In your problem description, please state your name, e-mail
address, and phone number. If your problem cannot be easily resolved via e-
mail, you will be given a support number to call.
10. Zan Software Contact Information
Zan Software
332 SE 7th Ave.
Delray Beach, FL 33483
E-mail: zan@gate.net
Web: www.gate.net/~zan
Fax: (561) 278-1373
Phone: Please e-mail us for a voice number. Sorry, no orders taken over
the phone.