Ref: 04450001
Title: Possible Cause of Error NET803 or NET810
Date: 3/7/90

Copyright 3Com Corporation, 1991.  All rights reserved.

On a DOS workstation either of the following errors can result from trying
to open a file with a bad pathname:

NET803: Network path not found
or
NET810: Unexpected network error

Both messages are followed by "Abort, Retry, Fail?"

The errors were observed after Paradox had tried to open a file with a path
containing two consecutive backslashes; for example, opening E:\\FILENAME
instead of E:\FILENAME.  The NET803 error occurred on a machine running
DOS 3.3.  The NET810 error occurred on a machine running Compaq DOS 3.31.

If an attempt is made to open a path with two backslashes from the DOS
Compatibility box on an OS/2 workstation, an equivalent error results.  The
Hard Error Box pops up with the message "The network path was not found,"
and user intervention is required (Return, End, Retry).

This error can be demonstrated from the command line by typing TYPE C:\\XYZ,
where C: is a valid network or local drive.  (It does not matter whether or
not C:\XYZ is really an existing file.)  The bad path will result in an error
message requiring user response (Abort, Retry, Fail) or the OS/2 box.

This seems to be a feature of the Redirector.  There is no known way
to avoid these critical errors other than to not specify a path with two
consecutive slashes.

The problem with Paradox was observed while producing a graph when the
Paradox configuration files were not in the current directory.  Paradox
internally generated a failing path while attempting to access one of
its files.  At the time of this writing, the problem has been reported
to Paradox, so it may be resolved in a future release.

