Without NIS support in the gateway product, you would have to define the resources manually for each client or install additional client software. Hummingbird's NFS Maestro Gateway had an advantage in the area of NIS support. Its software supports client browsing of NIS maps, automated drive mapping and more. In other words, it lets Windows clients browse and access NFS resources as easily as Unix clients. While NOS integration begins with NIS support, it doesn't end with it.
Flexibility is also important.
For example, if the gateway is restricted to one-way access, only Windows clients can access Unix resources, but not vice versa. Xlink's Omni-NFS Dual Gateway stood out because it is bidirectional, which allows Windows and Unix clients to have access to files across NT and Unix servers. With their centralized management and gateway server-based design, all the participants in this comparison are pretty scalable from a server perspective. However, scalability on the client side means allowing a client to establish and maintain many connections to a growing number of Unix resources. This can be tricky because only 26 drive letters are available to any Windows NFS client.