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Date:      Tue, 18 Jul 1995 10:51:38 +0930 (CST)
From:      Michael Smith <msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au>
To:        jan@bagend.atl.ga.us (Jan Isley)
Cc:        msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: basic no network setup question
Message-ID:  <199507180121.KAA04531@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au>
In-Reply-To: <m0sXqv8-0004qlC@bagend.atl.ga.us> from "Jan Isley" at Jul 17, 95 10:13:17 am

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Jan Isley stands accused of saying:
> 
> Thanks for you help, Michael.  I know this is a simple RTFM question
> for the network enabled.  I am network challenged.  Once I figure this
> out I promise to answer the next 25 similar questions in the newsgroup.

*chuckle* that's the spirit 8)

> :)  I need to get a networking 101 book.  Which one is in vogue right
> now?  The man pages are like all unix man pages, they tell you what
> you need to know if you already know what to look for.  That was the
> basis of my question, I did not know what a "normal" startup was
> supposed to look like.

If it gives you a login prompt, it's "normal" enough 8)

> I have no /etc/resolv.conf, nor a man page for it.  I installed the
> etc source distribution and there was not one there either.  I thought
> that I knew enough about networking that if I were uucp only I should
> comment bind out of host.conf.  I know, assumptions get me in trouble.

resolv.conf is described in the 'resolver' manual page; it points to
local nameservers.  No, what you did with /etc/host.conf is correct, with 
a hosttable-only configuration like yours you don't want to try looking
for a nameserver.

> 
> #	$Id: sysconfig,v 1.14 1995/05/17 04:46:57 rgrimes Exp $
> ...
> hostname=bagend.atl.ga.us
> ...
> network_interfaces="lo0"
> ifconfig_lo0="inet localhost"
> #
> # Set to the list of route add lines for this host.  You must have a
> # route_${static_routes} line for each static route listed here.
> #
> static_routes="multicast loopback"
> route_multicast="224.0.0.0 -netmask 0xf0000000 -interface ${hostname}"
> route_loopback="${hostname} localhost"

This all looks pretty good.  You can remove the multicast stuff above;
it's not useful, and in your case, possibly even confusing.

> Ah, hosts.  That is confusing.  The manpage is not illuminating.
> The only non commented line in hosts is the 127.0.0.1 line.
> "localhost" is every where in /etc.  At first I thought I should do:
> 
> 127.0.0.1		bagend bagend.atl.ga.us

Ok; nope.  127.0.0.1 should always be localhost. In your case, it 
should be 

127.0.0.1	localhost localhost.atl.ga.us

(ie. locahost.your.domain)

Then you want another entry for your machine.  If you're not connected to
the 'net, use an address in the 10.0.0 net, let's say

10.0.0.1	bagend bagend.atl.ga.us

> If that is right, the example is ... not good.  Actually the example
> "127.0.0.1  localhost localhost.my.domain" is not good anyway.  If it
> should be editited something other than "localhost" would help.
> Or, should 127.0.0.1 be something else altogether and should I then
> edit the imaginary network?

No, 127.0.0.1 is a "standard" number that is always assigned to the 
loopback interface; it's a guaranteed way of referring to your own
machine.  You can just call it 'localhost', but some applications
want to be able to always append your domain name to the end of any name
before looking it up, hence the second name on the line.

> # Imaginary network.
> #10.0.0.2		myname.my.domain myname
> #10.0.0.3		myfriend.my.domain myfriend
> 
> What "exactly" should be in /etc/hosts for a standalone system?  I
> appreciate your patience, really.

One of the most trying things with a BSD unix is getting it to be happy
without a network 8)  Having said that, give yourself an IP address out
of the 10. network, as I've shown above, and things should be fine.

You may find that you need to set the defaultrouter entry to "localhost"
for some things to work; this is pure conjecture, so don't go doing it
until you need it 8)

> Jan Isley              Heroes have the shelf life of cottage cheese,

-- 
]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer        msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au    [[
]] Genesis Software                     genesis@atrad.adelaide.edu.au   [[
]] High-speed data acquisition and                                      [[
]] realtime instrument control          (ph/fax) +61-8-267-3039         [[
]] My car has "demand start" - Terry Lambert                            [[



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