We don't use any of the other features of Netware. It just serves files. Also, I know next to nothing about Netware admining. I can add/chage/delete users info, shutdown/startup (not that I ever need to) the server, and use ncopy where appropriate. I'd have to nervously crack a book open for anything more involved like resintalling the thing. I'd just as soon put it up on a Samba share if it came to that.

We use the Windows Netware client. We tried the Novell client but it was too bloated for some of our lower end (p<200, 32MB) machines, and we just don't use any of the other features. Hell, I've got an old 486 running DOS hooked up for netadmin as I don't want to deal with NDS access on Windows (definitely not MS's NDS support, ughh) and none of the Windows/Java admin clients seem to do Bindery mode. I briefly thought of whipping up some scripts using the Linux NW tools (I use them for some file transfer stuff between servers), but the old 486 was easier.

I've got a Linux box running Samba for a WINS server and some file shares (and EMail, and Fax server, and Intranet). Clients are Win98. Windows Networking gets TCP/IP. Novell gets IPX. Seems to work OK.