hi
i tried to find out how to set up an ftp server in minix so that id be
able to access my minix files (running minix on vmware player) from my
host os (winxp) but the mapage is a bit cryptic for me..
would someone please explain to me quick what i have to do if i want to
make my /home/bin directory accessible via ftp?

thanx

martin

Add this line to /etc/rc.daemons:
daemonize tcpd ftp in.ftpd

Then restart Minix and type ifconfig to find out your IP address.
Suppose you find for example 192.168.0.8, then use your favourite FTP
client to go to ftp://192.168.0.8/. Use your username/password to log
in.

If you log in using root, your starting directory will be /root. Type
in the path ../home/bin to get to the folder you mentioned.

neither /etc/rc.daemons nor the daemonize command exist on my system
(im running minix with the vmware image to be found on the minix site)

I think daemonize is something builtin; on my Minix (also running on
VMWare) it doesn't exist as a file either.

As for the rc.daemons, you can simply create it as a text file with
only this line. I believe there is also a template file
/etc/rc.daemons.something which has the declaration already in it.

Daemonize is a shell function, defined in /usr/etc/rc. For reasons that
I don't fully understand the startup sequence is /etc/rc ->
/usr/etc/rc, but then /usr/etc/rc may invoke additional /etc/rc*
scripts. Perhaps the idea was to make sure that the sequence is
aborted if mounting the usr file system fails.

In any case, the daemonize function, since it is defined in a shell
script, can only be used in subordinate shell scripts sourced by the
script in which it is defined.

There have been some changes in the startup sequence between Minix
3.1.0 (the version on the OSDI/3 CD-ROM) and the latest release
(3.1.2). Rc.daemons is a recent addition, the jobs done by this file
were formerly done by /usr/etc/rc or by /etc/rc.net -- however,
originally /etc/rc/net was not provided, a user was expected to create
it if it was needed. In the latest releases /etc/rc.daemons is called
by /usr/etc/rc. It can also be called by /etc/rc.net.

Confusing? A bit... you should make hard copy of the various
/etc/rc*, /usr/etc/rc*, and /usr/local/etc/rc* (I didn't mention that,
did I?) files and read through the scripts to understand what is
happening.

BTW, you don't need to use daemonize, you can start a daemon
from the command line by typing:
  intr -d tcpd telnet in.telnetd &
(you need root privileges to do this). If you don't know what's
happening here read the tcpd(8) man page.

You say you can't find a tcpd(8) man page? Yeah, this is one of those
things that was not properly documented for a long time. A few months
ago I wrote a tcpd page, as well as a few other needed pages.  I also
updated a few pages that needed it. These have all been posted on
the minix3.org site by now, I believe. However, this was done so
recently that they are probably not part of any Minix 3 CD image yet.
You can get the new pages, ftp.1, http_status.5, httpd.8, httpd.conf.5,
mtools.1, tcpd.8 and urlget.1 from my site -- the URL is:

http://minix1.woodhull.com/current/2.0.4/fixes/man0606.tar.Z

... and yes, that's a Minix 2 site, but all these man pages
are equally applicable to Minix 3.

A last comment -- Minix 3 is changing rapidly and queries to the
newsgroup about problems should identify the version you are using.
An answer from someone using Minix 3.1.2a might not be correct for a
problem encountered with Minix 3.1.0.

- Al

I have some information on my blog about running ftp that might be
useful:

http://www.minixtips.com/2006/06/running-telnet-and-ftp-servers-with....

Chris.
--
http://www.minixtips.com

i really feel stupid asking this again, but it still doesnt work

ive never set up an ftp server
all i want to do is have some way to exchange data between my vmware
minix and my host system (win xp)

i (tried) to follow all your instructions..first, what you posted here
and then whats on your minixtips site, it all doesnt work
i always get this message on startup: daemonize: no such file or
directory

could you not give me a step by step instruction on how to do this and
what might be my problems with the daemonize thing?

thanx,

martin

Can you give a step by step instruction on exactly what you've done,
the contents of the various rc files you've changed, etc? That might
help to track it down.

Chris.
--
http://www.minixtips.com

well i've undone any changes to the rc files that i'd done before
because on startup i only got an error because daemonize couldnt be
found so the only thing was type at the shell prompt:

intr -d tcpd ftp in.ftpd &

which is said to start the ftp server
then i did:

ifconfig
(output: /dev/ip: address 192.168.112.128 netmask 255.255.255.0 mtu
1500)

so i tried ftp://192.168.112.128

on my host system browser but nothing can be found! what now?

thanx,

martin

Hello!
I too am facing this problem of being unable to either telnet nor ftp
from windows xp to the Minix guest running on VMWare.

I am able to ping the Minix guest, but thats it.

I have tried to ftp using the windows command prompt. This is what I
get:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------
C:\Documents and Settings\scharan>ftp 192.168.137.142
Connected to 192.168.137.142.
Connection closed by remote host.

C:\Documents and Settings\scharan>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------

When I tried to ftp using Filezilla, here is what is happenning:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------
Status: Connecting to 192.168.137.142 ...
Status: Connected with 192.168.137.142. Waiting for welcome message...
Error:  Disconnected from server
Error:  Unable to connect!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------

When I tried to telnet from the command prompt, there is no visible
activity on the screen. But, if I try to type anything at this point in
time, I am returned to the command prompt.

If need be I can send a copy of my Minix image for anyone to check out
- just mail me by hitting "Reply to author" link. I have tried
everything mentioned in this thread already. Just one curio though:
In the article on setting up ftp and telnet servers, Chris writes and I
quote:

"To work around this you can pass a 'redir' option to 'qemu' which
tells it to listen on a particular port on the host machine, and
re-route connections from that to a port on the Minix machine. As an
example, starting Minix with the following 'qemu':

qemu -localtime -hda minix.img -net user -net nic -redir tcp:5023::23"

Is there some such thing that needs to be done on VMWare???

Anxious for a solution.
Thanks in advance,
Sri Charan

No, not if you are using the 'bridged networking' option in VMWare. If
you use that then ftp, telnet, etc should work fine. I'm using VMWare
server and running it on Linux if that makes a difference.

Chris.
--
http://www.minixtips.com

I am using VMWare Player 1.0.2 which is bundled with VMWare Workstation
5.5.2 that I am evalutating. I had also tried with VMWare Player 1.0.1,
but the results are the same: Unable to connnect either through FTP or
Telnet.

I was using NAT. This works for me for my RedHat 9 guest. I tried to
configure for Bridged Networking, but I was unable to even ping. Albert
Woodhull also mentions at: http://minix1.woodhull.com/faq/morevmw.html
that :
"I should emphasize that the problems I encountered were mostly because
the VMWare documentation did not point out that changes to the Windows
configuration were needed. If you have read this, now you know what I
didn't know."

But, he does not say what was done to overcome the "problems". So I am
not sure if I am missing something. So, could please you give a brief
outline of what needs to be done for setting up bridged networking???

Regards,
Sri Charan

were needed. If you have read this, now you know what I didn't know."

Earlier in the article cited I wrote:

"I discovered that when VMWare is installed it adds an option in the
Windows networking configuration, but does not enable it. You need to
go to the Windows Network and Dialup connections control panel and
select the Properties of your ethernet card. You will then see that in
addition to the familiar Client for Microsoft Networks, File and
Printer Sharing, and Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) options already
selected, there is now an unchecked VMWare Bridge Protocol option. Once
I checked this (and rebooted Windows) the VMWare Virtual Network Editor
showed that a bridge existed between VMnet0 and my Intel 21041 ethernet
card, and I was able to connect between my Minix guest system and other
systems."

I wrote this in April 2005, when I was using VMWare workstation rather
than the VMWare Player. I was then using Windows 2000 rather than
Windows XP, so it is possible that this description does not exactly
describe what needs to be done with a newer configuration. If someone
can update this I will add to my pages.

I'm now using Minix 2.0.4 and Minix 3.1.2a virtual machines that
network successfully to both external systems and the Windows host.
The configuration is VMWare Player 1.0.2 build-29634, on a Windows XP
Professional Version 2002, Service Pack 2 host running on a 697 Mhz
Pentium III with 256 MB RAM.  It works, but I'm not at this point sure
about what I had to to do to make it work.

- Al

Hello All,

Still no success. All settings are as described in the post...

Still hopeful...

Success!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A little bit of history:
Yesterday, I had to set up a RedHat 9 Guest OS for one of my faculty
members. I realized that even though telnet was installed and running,
I was unable to access it even locally!!! Then I realized that I had to
edit the 'telnet' file in /etc/xinetd.d to allow incoming telnet
connections (inspite of changes to the firewall configuration to allow
incoming telnet connections).

Back to present:
So I realized that perhaps something similar needs to be done even with
Minix (after all, it is a variant of Unix and must have similar
security features!!!). But, when I went to the /etc folder in Minix, I
found no xinetd.d folder. Looking around, I found the serv.access file.
Guessing that it must be the right place to look, I opened it. Bingo!
There it was. Only, I had to decipher how the entires should look like
in that file. Ever so helpful, a comment asked me to man serv.access.
Also, I looked at the /usr/adm/log file. It was all there - all those
access denied messages...

Initially, my /etc/serv.access file was like this:

# /etc/serv.access

# 2006-05-21

# See the serv.access(5) man pages to learn how to edit this file

# to make your system safe on the network.

# this is insecure! replace with something more specific asap

telnet ftp: +* log;

# this is better, keep outsiders out

# telnet ftp: +*.local log;

# this records all unsuccessful access attempts in/usr/adm/log

*:      -* log;

After a reading the man page and a little tinkering, I changed the line
"telnet ftp: +* log;" to "telnet ftp: + log;". i.e., I just removed the
*. May be very insecure, but it does the job for me. Perhaps one could
add an IP address or a range of IPs to enhance security (as described
in the man page).

One another word:
This might be very helpful on the VMWare front:

I am still using NAT. I had to just set the IP address of my Minix to
be on the same subnet as VMNet8 (which is the default subnet on which
VMWare does NAT-ing). Also, the default gateway on the guest OS - Minix
- had to be set to VMNet8-subnet-.2 ( The .2 IP is the gateway across
which VMWare does NAT).

Thats it!!!. All works fine now...

Three cheers to Minix.
Regards,
Sri Charan K.
MTech(CS) Student,
Department of Mathematics & Computer Science,
Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning, (www.sssihl.edu.in)
Prashanthi Nilayam,
Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh,
India - 515134