From owner-freebsd-questions Mon Jul 22 12:05:53 1996 Return-Path: owner-questions Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) id MAA26337 for questions-outgoing; Mon, 22 Jul 1996 12:05:53 -0700 (PDT) Received: from relay-5.mail.demon.net (relay-5.mail.demon.net [158.152.1.48]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id MAA26330 for ; Mon, 22 Jul 1996 12:05:50 -0700 (PDT) Received: from post.demon.co.uk by relay-5.mail.demon.net id bp11792; 22 Jul 96 18:27 +0100 Received: from jraynard.demon.co.uk ([158.152.42.77]) by relay-3.mail.demon.net id aa20802; 22 Jul 96 18:03 +0100 Received: (from fqueries@localhost) by jraynard.demon.co.uk (8.7.5/8.6.12) id KAA01102; Mon, 22 Jul 1996 10:23:31 GMT From: James Raynard Message-Id: <199607221023.KAA01102@jraynard.demon.co.uk> Subject: Re: running system with no hostname... To: Red Barchetta Date: Mon, 22 Jul 1996 10:23:31 +0000 () Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: from "Red Barchetta" at Jul 21, 96 09:53:24 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24 ME8a] Content-Type: text Sender: owner-questions@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > Anyway, my question/problem stems from the fact that I connect to the > internet via a dialup PPP link (haven't tried yet under FreeBSD) and that I > therefore do not have a hostname assigned to my machine. For now, I have > placed an arbitrary name in the "hostname" field of /etc/sysconfig, but I get > all sorts of daemons telling me on botup that the hostname (obviously) > doesn't exist. I know I can turn off things like sendmail until I get a > permanent link in the fall, but can someone warn me as to what types of > problems running without a "real" hostname can cause (the comments in > sysconfig and the installer both stress the importance of this value)? Just put an entry in /etc/hosts, using one of the reserved IP addresses for your fictitious host name, eg 127.0.0.1 localhost 192.168.0.1 foobar Also, change your /etc/host.conf to read hosts bind so that it'll look in /etc/hosts first instead of doing a DNS query. > Also, is there any way to tell FreeBSD's network daemons *not* to perform a > hostname lookup (i.e. just use the dynamic IP address instead)? If you've set PPP up correctly (see the Handbook for details), your machine should magically set itself up on connection so it appears to have the correct IP address.