using hostname instead of ip addresses

[A Lim]

Hi,

Got a (newbie?) question which I am not sure if it was documented anywhere in the manuals (and I have search the forum with hostname as the keyword but don’t seems to find any question like this one).

Basically, is it possible to use hostnames in the cloverleaf threads instead of IP addresses when configuring in NetConfig?

If so, what was the things we need to look out for? If I am wrong, the basic is for the cloverleaf server to be able to resolve the hostname to an IP address, but does cloverleaf server does it automatically (e.g. look through DNS or the host file) or do we need to have additional codes, tcl or otherwise, to implement this?

Would appreciate some help with this query. Thanks!

Topic

[Robert Kersemakers]

Hi,

All questions are welcome here.

As our old HP-UX Cloverleaf servere didn’t have access to the DNS, we just couldn’t use hostnames so we have always used ip-adresses. Even now on RHEL, where we have DNS connection, we still use only ip-addresses. Reason for that is that our firewall only accepts ip-adresses, so if we would use hostnames and the ip-address of an external host would change, then it wouldn’t go through the firewall anyway.

But it is possible to use hostnames as well as ip-adresses in Cloverleaf: I just tried it with one connection and it works. If the hostname resolves on the prompt of the Cloverleaf server, like this

Code:

orbis_0211 ~> nslookup srv-app-2022.orbis.local
Server:         172.28.60.1
Address:        172.28.60.1#53

Name:   srv-app-2022.orbis.local
Address: 172.28.102.22

orbis_0211 ~>

then you can use the hostname (in this example srv-app-2022.orbis.local) also in Cloverleaf.

If the hostname doesn’t resolve, then you can’t use it in Cloverleaf either. Could also be a problem with your connection to the DNS though.

Code:

orbis_0211 ~> nslookup www.pokemongokrazie.com
Server:         172.28.60.1
Address:        172.28.60.1#53

** server can’t find www.pokemongokrazie.com: NXDOMAIN

orbis_0211 ~>

Zuyderland Medisch Centrum; Heerlen/Sittard; The Netherlands

[David Barr]

I find hostnames much easier to work with. They are easier to remember, and when reviewing the configuration for a thread it’s easier to understand what you’re connecting to and if there are typos in the field. Also, servers sometimes get their addresses changed. It’s much better to be able to correct this in only one place (DNS) rather than having to go into all of the places that are storing the address. A lot of the time these changes have to be made quickly to avoid downtime, and DNS updates are more efficient.

[Max Drown (Infor)]

Yes, you can use hostname, hostname.domain.etc., or IP address.

-- Max Drown (Infor)

[Author]

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