RE: [Qemu-devel] SMB for DOS ?

[Andreas Bollhalder]

Hello Fabrice

> In order to have similar features to dosemu in QEMU, implementing
MFS 
> support in QEMU would be useful, but it would require a lot of work.

I use QEmu mainly for running GEOS under FreeDOS on my WinXP system.
There are different drivers for DOS network file access (M$, Novell,
Pathfinder and a lot more). MFS is the definition used under DOS.
Unfortunatly, the Microsoft Client for DOS (SMB access) eats away the
most of directly acessible RAM, so that a lot of apps won't run. The
Novell client (NetWare access) doesn't work for the lack of IPX
support.

It would be very nice to have a direct interface for host file access
trough the emulation of a device. I know, it requires a driver on the
guest side. For DOS, it means a driver which provides the MFS
interface to the OS. The DOS apps which are able to access network
files should have no problems.

A direct interface would allow a faster access to the host files.
Small OS's, like for example Topsy, could faster integrate a driver
for QEmu then a complete network stack and SMB.

Maybe somone would write an RFC for host <-> guest exchange...
Accessing the files, grafic, sound, network and other hardware. Every
OS could then implement default drivers for running inside an
emulation... And in every CPU design, there should be a reserved bit
for defining it to a virtual one... Sorry, I'm dreaming.

I use GEOS since 1991 and have tons of documents I still use. The
emulation in QEmu works very good. Only the sound could be a little
bit better. The main advantage is that the network is running very
fast compared to Bochs. I use the Novell drivers for DOS and GEOS sets
up the TCP/IP stack on it.

Andreas