I have an intranet server running Suse 11.0. I can browse the website by typing in the IP addres, i.e.: https://192.168.1.252
However, I need to be able to browse to the website using the Linux hostname, i.e.: https://inet2.domain.com
Is there something I need to do on the Linux box in order to register the Linux hostname on the DNS server, or is there something I have to enter manually in the Windows DNS server? I have tried manually entering a an “A” record, but that doesn’t seem to work, so I think I’m missing something. Both the host name and the site name are the same (“inet2”) - is that a possible problem?
(You can actually have an A record in this zone file point to some other IP entirely.)
Honestly it does not really matter what the hostname of the server is - the A record should just point the matching DNS requests to the target IP. (Well, the host name would matter if it were a nameserver or mail server - but as it is just a web server, it should make no difference.)
Depends on what client machine you’re using to access your website, are you browsing from the machine itself or do you want to browse the website from multiple remote machines?
If from just the local machine, then all you’d likely need to do is make an entry in your Hosts file (You can do this through YAST if you don’t want to edit /etc/hosts directly).
If you’re browsing from one local machine, you can still modify the local hosts file on the client machine.
If you’re browsing from multiple remote machines, then if you have control over the DNS server in your LAN you can create an A record in your Domain.
Note that normally your LAN hosts are pointing to only one DNS server in your LAN, so assuming that you’re running in a Windows network (Domain?), then that is the DNS you may need to add a record to, not some DNS server running locally on your SuSE server. Verify what DNS your client machine(s) are using, on Windows boxes type at a command line
ipconfig /all
Note also that since you’re trying to browse an SSL website, the website’s certificate also has to be configured with a CN describing the URL you’re using… So, for instance in your situation if you’re using a certificate with a CN 192.168.1.252 you won’t be able to use a FQDN like “inet2.domain.com” without getting a warning (which can be over-ridden but would be bad practice).
If you want people to access your website using a different name like https://inet2.domain.com you’ll have to create and install a new certificate into that website with the new name.