A.P. Lawrence

/etc/hosts routing dns

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From - Mon Oct  1 07:15:23 2001
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From: Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sco.misc
Subject: Re: Network Routing Problem
Date: Sun, 30 Sep 2001 09:12:41 -0700
Organization: Committee to Maintain and Independent Xenix
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I think you missed the point and the purpose of /etc/hosts.

The contents of /etc/hosts has nothing to do with establishing a route
to a remote computer.  You could put anything you want into /etc/hosts
and you still will not accomplish anything useful for routeing.  What
/etc/hosts does is a crude form of DNS (Don't kNow Service).  If you
have a computer name that constantly needs to be converted into an IP
address, put it in /etc/hosts and you won't need to go to the
nameserver every time that name needs to be resolved.  It's also
required for local network machine names that are NOT known to a DNS
server.

On the other foot, routeing is a bit more complex.  Run:
  netstat -rn
to see your router table.  The way it works (assuming static routes)
is that you start with a list of pre-defined routes to specific
machines and specific networks.  For example, if the local network is
a class C (256 IP's) at 192.168.111.XXX, everything destined for that
block of IP's will stay local and not go out via some router or
gateway.  If there's a remote block of machines at 192.168.222.xxx,
there will be a gateway shown in the router table, that says:
  "everything for 192.168.222.XXX shall go via that gateway"
If there are additional blocks of IP's, each will have a gateway which
designates which freeway offramp to take to get to the 192.168.222.xxx
block of IP's.  

Near the bottom is the default route, which points to a gateway to
take if the destination IP is NOT local, and NOT one of the static
routes.  Usually, it points to an ISP and the internet.

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On Sat, 29 Sep 2001 14:23:29 -0400, "Frank J. Hajek"
<fjhajek@bellsouth.net> wrote:

>True. I missed the routing issue.
>
>Then, add route logic edited into /etc/tcp may do it, unless there are
>hundreds of combinations and subject to frequent changes. In that case, a
>separately maintained file sourced in /etc/tcp??
>
>
>Jean-Pierre Radley wrote:
>
>> Frank J. Hajek propounded (on Thu, Sep 13, 2001 at 04:24:00PM -0400):
>>
>> | Why not just add those hosts to /etc/hosts? Works for me.
>>
>> Adding a host to etc/hosts just helps to quickly get its IP number.  It
>> has zilch to do with routing packets to that host or to any other host.
>>
>> --
>> JP

-- 
Jeff Liebermann  150 Felker St #D  Santa Cruz CA 95060
(831)421-6491 pgr (831)426-1240 fax (831)336-2558 home
http://www.LearnByDestroying.com   WB6SSY
jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us   jeffl@cruzio.com

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