Why ping .local?

[rick71]

I have just upgraded to 13.1. Previously on my home network I have been able to ping machines with just their host names. Now, for the 13.1 machines, I have to append .local to the host name. For instance 'ping tower.local' instead of "ping local'. Can anyone tell why this is?

Any and all help appreciated.

[hcvv]

Please show

grep -v '^#' /etc/resolv.conf

[rick71]

Please show

grep -v '^#' /etc/resolv.conf

 grep -v '^#' /etc/resolv.conf
search homenet
nameserver 192.168.1.1

[deano_ferrari]

I have just upgraded to 13.1. Previously on my home network I have been able to ping machines with just their host names. Now, for the 13.1 machines, I have to append .local to the host name. For instance 'ping tower.local' instead of "ping local'. Can anyone tell why this is?

Any and all help appreciated.

I don't have a complete understanding of this by any means, but there was a post here concerning hostname resolution and Avahi, describing the same need to append '.local' to the hostname. However, this concerns mDNS/DNS-SD, rather than other kinds of name resolution services. Maybe that makes a difference?

Check out

man nsswitch.conf

[hcvv]

 grep -v '^#' /etc/resolv.conf
search homenet
nameserver 192.168.1.1

Well, from your story I assume that the systems in your LAN have "local" as their domain.
The output above says that when you do only specify a host name (without domain specification), the resolver will try to find if this name exists in the "homenet" domain.

I have no idea why the domain "homenet" is there, but when you change that to

search local

it will try to resolve monkey.local if you ask it to resolve monkey (and the same for others like tower).

But again, I have no idea why "homenet" is there. Thus it could be that resolving systems belonging to the domain "homenet" will be problematic now. When you think the "homenet" is also a valid and often used domain name in your environment, you could go for

search  local  homenet

or

search  homenet local

[rick71]

Well, from your story I assume that the systems in your LAN have "local" as their domain.
The output above says that when you do only specify a host name (without domain specification), the resolver will try to find if this name exists in the "homenet" domain.

I have no idea why the domain "homenet" is there, but when you change that to

search local

it will try to resolve monkey.local if you ask it to resolve monkey (and the same for others like tower).

But again, I have no idea why "homenet" is there. Thus it could be that resolving systems belonging to the domain "homenet" will be problematic now. When you think the "homenet" is also a valid and often used domain name in your environment, you could go for

search  local  homenet

or

search  homenet local

homenet is there because that is what I put into the Domain Name in YAST's Network Settings, replacing "site" as the Domain Name.

[hcvv]

homenet is there because that is what I put into the Domain Name in YAST's Network Settings, replacing "site" as the Domain Name.

Then why do you try to use "local"?

[rick71]

I don't have a complete understanding of this by any means, but there was a post here concerning hostname resolution and Avahi, describing the same need to append '.local' to the hostname. However, this concerns mDNS/DNS-SD, rather than other kinds of name resolution services. Maybe that makes a difference?

Check out

man nsswitch.conf

My edited nswitch.conf file worked with 12.1, 12.2 and a couple of other opensuse versions. In fact, my nsswitch.conf for 12.1, 12.2 and 13.1 are identical.

I'm trying to figure out what changed from 12.2 to 13.1 and why.

[rick71]

I have just upgraded to 13.1. Previously on my home network I have been able to ping machines with just their host names. Now, for the 13.1 machines, I have to append .local to the host name. For instance 'ping tower.local' instead of "ping local'. Can anyone tell why this is?

Any and all help appreciated.

There should have been an edit above. I should have said:
For instance 'ping tower.local' instead of "ping tower'.

[rick71]

Then why do you try to use "local"?

Bad typing on my part. I should have said:
Now, for the 13.1 machines, I have to append .local to the host name. For instance 'ping tower.local' instead of "ping tower'.
Sorry for the confusion.