On 28 Nov 2001, at 15:25, Nicholas Bacetti wrote:

> I've set up a two PC network using a hub, both machines are
> running Win98.  The problem I'm having is that when I launch
> network neighborhood, the only icons that are displayed are the
> Entire Network icon, and the host computer's icon.  If I further
> click on Entire Network, no additional icon are displayed within
> Entire Network.  How can I get Network Neighborhood to display an
> icon for the other computer on the network?
>
> FYI, I can ping one computer from the other.  Furthermore, if I go
> to Start>Find>Computer>Name, and enter the name of the other
> computer, it returns a message "computer not found", however if I
> enter the IP address of the other computer, it returns a linked
> icon to the other computer, which I can launch, and which displays
> those folders and printers that I've set up to share.  In fact, I
> can print from the remote computer.
>
> One last piece of info, when I launch winipconf, the IP addess and
> subnet mask aren't present.  However, they are present under the
> properies box, in the TCP/IP<Network<Control Panel option.  (I
> manually entered both the IP and subnet under  "Specify an IP
> address").
>
> Thanks in advance...Nick

  The fact that "ping" works appears to indicate that your machines
can exchange traffic using TCP/IP.  [It would be nice if you'd say
what addresses you're using, just to verify that.]  Odds are that
there's nothing wrong with the address and subnet mask settings you
have chosen.  The fact that you can get to shares by IP address would
indicate that NetBIOS is able to work over this TCP/IP connection
just fine.

  So there are two things that are not working:

1.  Network Neighborhood
  Information on this list comes from the "browse master".  When a
machine joins the network, it broadcasts looking for the browse
master to retrieve this list.  If it can't find one, it broadcasts an
election call, and all of the machines on the segment that could be
browse masters offer their qualifications -- the "most qualified"
wins.  If nobody answers, the machine has to assume that *it* is the
browse master, and that's how your machines seem to be behaving.
  There's an option in, I believe, the "Client for Windows Networks"
properties, that governs whether a Win98 machine will offer itself
for election as browse master or not.  I suspect that you've turned
this off, following someone's recommendation as a "performance
tweak", and so neither machine is standing for office.

2.  Name resolution to address
  Can the machines ping each other by NAME, rather than by address?
I expect you can, but if you cannot then for some reason NetBIOS name
resolution is not working.  IF that's the case, you can fill in
appropriate entries in the "lmhosts" files on the machines for now.

David Gillett

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