RE: Checking file existence on windows server

[Mike Cunningham <mcunning@xxxxxxx>]

It would send shivers through our windows admins to ask them to install an add on for fear of making the server unstable. 

-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Simon Coulter
Sent: Monday, August 09, 2010 8:06 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: Re: Checking file existence on windows server


On 09/08/2010, at 11:26 PM, Mike Cunningham wrote:

> Can anyone give me an idea of the best, most reliable, way (if it is  
> even possible) to check to see if a file exists on a Windows server  
> from an iSeries RPG (or CL) application? I want to try and condition  
> an action in an RPG application based on a picture files existing or  
> not existing on the windows server. My only thought is to create an  
> IFS directory and FTP all the files from the server directory to the  
> IFS and then check to see if an IFS file exists using CHKIFSOBJ

You could do this with SMB/CIFS via the QNTC file system but, as I've  
said on numerous occasions, QNTC and NetServer are woefully pathetic  
implementations of SMB/CIFS.

Use Network File System (NFS) support instead. WinDOS supports this  
via an optionally installable (free) set of tools called Unix tools  
(or Unix support) or something similar. They will be on your  
distribution media as long as you have something better than the  
crappy home versions. Install the NFS server on WinDOS and configure  
it to export the directory in question.

Start NFS on OS/400 and mount the exported share. Create a separate  
mount point for this:

	MKDIR '/mount'
	MKDIR '/mount/windos-dir-name'
	MOUNT TYPE(*NFS) MFS('windos-dir-path') MNTOVRDIR('/mount/windos-dir- 
name') ...

See previous e-mail from me on this list on 26th July showing more  
information.

Once successfully mounted I think you should be able to use the  
access() API to check for existence.

Regards,
Simon Coulter.
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