Thanks, Ray. Dhcp-relay is exactly what I wanted to know about. Unfortunatly, some of the machines on the local network are running M$ Windows, which from googling I learn lacks real IP Aliasing support - you can get multiple static IPs, but not static & DHCP at the same time. So at least for the windows boxes, I will probably switch to DHCP only.
Yeah, that's a problem. Though I use Windows as well as Linux, I'm not really all that expert in Windows configuration, so I was only really addressing the Linux parts of your problem.
Which brings up a new question: is there an easy way to change the IP address a hostname refers to when the machine's IP address changes. For example, the host named gamebox crashes, and after reboot has a different IP than before. Is there a nice way to tell all the other computers on the local net that gamebox's address has changed?
How do they know it in the first place? The answer to this governs how easy it is to change. Possibilities are (I'm giving Linux approaches, but I know there are Windows analogs to all of them):
1. A local /etc/hosts file on each machine. In this case, there is no sane way to do what you want.
2. A DNS server that is authoritative for the LAN. In this case, the fact that the DHCP assignment comes from a different host (the ISP) make it tough, as the DNS host itself will not receive the lease info for other hosts. The only workaround I can think of for that is that DHCP clients typically include a way to run an arbitrary script or program whenever the address changes. You could write a pair of scripts -- one on each DHCP host that sends a message to the DNS server to update info, the other on the DNS server to receive the information and use it to update the DNS records. (This is just a scaled-down version of what services that provide authoritative DNS resolution for hosts with dynamic addresses do.)
3. SMB shares. This information is provided to the SMB server by the host and should be updated whenever an address changes. I've never had a problem with that, other than a modest bit of latency.
I'm guessing that with how common DHCP is, there must be a way, but I don't know what it would be.
Actually, to my knowledge, there is no GOOD way to keep DNS-assigned hostnames stable when the IP address changes. I hope someone else here knows of one and chimes in, as I've had to work around this limitation myself from time to time.
[old stuff deleted]
- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-newbie" in the body of a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.linux-learn.org/faqs
