Establishing a NetBIOS connection

A NetBIOS connection is initiated from a queue manager that uses the ConnectionName parameter on its channel definition to connect to a target listener.

To set up a NetBIOS connection, follow these steps:

1. At each end of the channel specify the local NetBIOS name to be used by the IBM MQ channel processes in the queue manager configuration file qm.ini. For example, the NETBIOS stanza in Windows at the sending end might look like the following:

   NETBIOS:
    LocalName=WNTNETB1
   

   and at the receiving end:

   NETBIOS:
    LocalName=WNTNETB2
   

   Each IBM MQ process must use a different local NetBIOS name. Do not use the system name as the NetBIOS name because Windows already uses it.

2. At each end of the channel, verify the LAN adapter number being used on the system. The IBM MQ for Windows default for logical adapter number 0 is NetBIOS running over an Internet Protocol network. To use native NetBIOS we must select logical adapter number 1. See Establishing the LAN adapter number. Specify the correct LAN adapter number in the NETBIOS stanza of the Windows registry. For example:

   NETBIOS:
    AdapterNum=1
   

3. So that sender channel initiation works, specify the local NetBIOS name by the MQNAME environment variable:

    SET MQNAME=WNTNETB1I
   

   This name must be unique.

4. At the sending end, define a channel specifying the NetBIOS name being used at the other end of the channel. For example:

   DEFINE CHANNEL (WINNT.OS2.NET) CHLTYPE(SDR) +
          TRPTYPE(NETBIOS) +
          CONNAME(WNTNETB2) +
          XMITQ(OS2) +
          MCATYPE(THREAD) +
          REPLACE
   

   We must specify the option MCATYPE(THREAD) because, on Windows, sender channels must be run as threads.

5. At the receiving end, define the corresponding receiver channel. For example:

   DEFINE CHANNEL (WINNT.OS2.NET) CHLTYPE(RCVR) +
          TRPTYPE(NETBIOS) +
          REPLACE
   

6. Start the channel initiator because each new channel is started as a thread rather than as a new process.

   runmqchi
   

7. At the receiving end, start the IBM MQ listener:

   runmqlsr -t netbios
   

   Optionally we can specify values for the queue manager name, NetBIOS local name, number of sessions, number of names, and number of commands. See Defining a NetBIOS connection on Windows for more information about setting up NetBIOS connections.

Parent topic: Example IBM MQ configuration for Windows