On Tue, Nov 10, 2026 at 15:59:04 -0000, CGS wrote:
> On 2026-11-10, John Hasler <[email protected]> wrote:
> > nwe writes:
> >> The downside with dhcp, is, the automatic ip address assigned can
> >> change from time to time, which would prevent you from connecting via
> >> ssh to the linux box. The fix for that is to set a static ip address
> >> on the debian linux box, that is compatible with your internal
> >> network.
> >
> > Or to give the linux box a name.
>
> But a name is tied to an address, isn't it, in /etc/hosts?
Yes.
Here's what I would recommend for Karen:
1) She most likely has a router that hands out IP addresses by DHCP.
Let that continue to do its job, for smart phones, etc. Any device
that needs a local IP address, and isn't the Debian or MS-DOS
system, can continue using that DHCP service.
2) Find out whether the router can be configured to assign a consistent
address to a given device. If it can (and this is VERY likely), then:
2a) Set up the Debian and MS-DOS systems to get their local IP addresses
through DHCP, and once they have those addresses, tell the router
to make those assignments permanent.
2b) If the router cannot do this, then find out whether there is some
part of the network address space that the DHCP server leaves
untouched. Either at the top or the bottom, there's usually some
gap where the numbers are reserved for admin use, and won't be
assigned to DHCP clients. In this case, assign static IP addresses
from this portion of the network address space to the Debian and
MS-DOS systems.
3) On the Debian system, edit the /etc/hosts file to contain the name
and the local IP address of the MS-DOS system, and any other systems
that you want to talk to by name.
4) On the MS-DOS system, do the equivalent.
