SETTING UP MICROSOFT WINDOWS FOR WORKGROUPS TCP/IP SUPPORT

Jeff Balvanz (jbalvanz@iastate.edu)

February 16, 2006

NOTE:  it's getting really, really hard to find Windows 3.x applications, and what is available is old and cruddy.  If you must use an old DOS-ish machine on the Internet, you might be better off dumping Windows 3.x and getting a newer graphical shell like OpenGEM (available at http://gem.shaneland.co.uk/) instead.  Still, if you've got Win3x applications already installed...the truth of the matter is, you're probably more secure using Win3x than Win95.  So...

Running Internet applications like Netscape on a Windows 3.x machine requires the use of Windows Sockets software, commonly referred to as a "Winsock". If you will be using only Windows for Workgroups networking on your machine and you have version 3.11 of Windows for Workgroups, the logical choice for a Winsock is Microsoft's TCP/IP-32 version 3.11b. This is available directly from Microsoft as the file TCP32B.EXE, from the Microsoft Download Center at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads.

Before You Start Installing:

You'll need several items before you start this process:

  1. A blank, formatted diskette on which to expand the TCP/IP software. (If you have received this software on a diskette, perhaps from the Durham Center PC labs, then skip to the section titled "Installing Microsoft TCP/IP-32b".)
  2. An appropriate Ethernet card or other Ethernet adapter (like a PCMCIA card or parallel port adapter) in your computer.
  3. An active Ethernet port and appropriate cabling. Contact the Telecommunications office (271 Durham Center or 294-8585) to have this connected. There may be a small installation fee.
  4. An IP number assigned to your machine. If you're a student, Telecommunications assigns you an address when you have your Ethernet port activated. Otherwise, use the "request" command on Project Vincent or send e-mail to "dns@iastate.edu" to request an IP address. A host name will also be assigned to your machine when you receive your IP number.

To use TCP/IP-32 you will need to have Windows for Workgroups networking already in place. Follow the directions included with Windows to install your network adapter. If you're installing Windows for the first time, Windows Setup will ask you what kind of network card you have and other pertinent information. If you have already installed Windows and are adding the network card, open the "Network" program group, double-click on "Network Setup" and follow the directions (asking for help with the {F1} key if necessary).

Once you've installed the network parts of Windows for Workgroups, test the network setup. Open the File Manager (found in the Main program group). Select the "Connect a Network Drive" command from the Disk menu. A list of the other Workgroups computers on the campus network should appear. If you see a list of computer names, your network is properly installed and active. Then you can continue with these instructions for installing the TCP/IP protocol.

Obtaining the Microsoft TCP/IP-32b Files

The first step in installing Microsoft's TCP/IP-32 is obtaining the necessary software.  This is still made available via the Microsoft Download Center.  You will need access to a Windows or DOS computer with and Internet connection, a Web browser and a floppy diskette drive.  Using your favorite Web browser, download the URL http://download.microsoft.com/download/wfw311/update/3.11b/wfw/en-us/tcp32b.exe.  The file TCP32B.EXE is a self-extracting archive, which you can extract like this:

  1. Start a command prompt.
  2. Insert a blank, formatted diskette in drive A.
  3. Change the default directory on your hard disk to the directory you downloaded TCP32B.EXE to. Type cd \pathname{Enter}, where "pathname" is the name of the directory.
  4. Change the default to drive A by typing A:{Enter}.
  5. Unpack the files by typing C:TCP32B{Enter}.

Now you have a diskette containing the TCP/IP-32b files. Continue with the section "INSTALLING MICROSOFT TCP/IP-32b".

Installing Microsoft TCP/IP-32b

From the Program Manager, open the Network program group and double-click on the "Network Setup" icon. Your Network Setup dialog should look something like the one below, although your network adapter may be different. (This machine happens to use an SMC EtherEZ card).

Network Setup Dialog Box

Click on the "Drivers" button or press {Alt/D} to display the "Network Drivers" dialog box. You'll get a dialog box that looks like this one:

Make sure that the network adapter at the top is highlighted and click the button labeled "Add Protocol" or press {Alt/P}. The "Add Network Protocol" dialog box dialog box will appear.

From the protocol list select "Unlisted or Updated Protocol" and click "OK". A dialog box will appear asking where the files are located. Indicate that they are in A:\ (the default) and click on "OK".

After a few seconds another dialog box will appear listing the protocols on the diskette; select "Microsoft TCP/IP-32 3.11b" and click "OK" or press {Enter}. Files will be copied to your hard disk, and you'll be returned to the Network Drivers dialog.

Now another protocol should appear under your Ethernet adapter, "Microsoft TCP/IP-32 3.11b". Highlight "Microsoft TCP/IP-32 3.11b" and click on "Setup" or press {Alt/S}. The "Microsoft TCP/IP Configuration" dialog box will appear:

In this dialog box, check "Enable Automatic DHCP Configuration".  This will allow your machine to be assigned an IP address automatically.

When you have entered information in these three fields, click on the button labeled "DNS" or press {Alt/N}. The "Microsoft TCP/IP - Connectivity Configuration" dialog box will appear.

You'll need to enter information in four fields. The first field, "Host Name", is the name of your computer.  This must be unique on campus, and we generally recommend that you use your ISU NetID followed by some qualifier, like "joeuser-win3". Note that you'll probably have four parts to your host name (as in mpczstvp.cc.iastate.edu) but you'll only put the first part in the host name field (e.g., mpczstvp). Double-click in or tab to that field and enter the host name.

The "Domain Name" field should always read "iastate.edu"; click on or tab to the field and enter it.

Next, tab to or click in the left side of the box labeled "Domain Name Services (DNS) Search Order". Enter the addresses of the three nameservers in the list to the right of the "Domain Name Services (DNS) Search Order" list:

129.186.142.200
129.186.140.200
129.186.1.200

To enter these values, tab to or click in the box on the left of the Search Order list, enter the numbers for one of the servers in the box, and click the "Add" button. Then repeat the process for the other two nameservers. Those numbers, by the way, can be entered in any order.

Finally, add the domain name "iastate.edu" to the "Domain Suffix Search Order" list in the same way.

Click on "OK" and/or "Close" repeatedly to close Network Setup and save the changes. Then exit Windows (as Network Setup will probably demand) and restart your machine. After that, WinSock applications should work as advertised.

Obtaining Internet Software

Microsoft's TCP/IP-32 software does include a telnet client and an FTP client. You'll probably want more than that, and be (for the most part) sadly disappointed.  There are some places you can get Internet software, but much of it is outdated, with expired certificates and outdated Javascript capabilities.  Still, you've been warned.  Here are some places to look: