[ale] Q: "Server Assigned Nameserver" Setup

[Michael D. Ivey]

On Thu, Sep 23, 1999 at 07:38:33AM -0400, Wandered Inn wrote:
> This prompts two questions for me.  First, I thought someone posted that
> DHCP didn't provide DNS.  

DHCP can provide DNS server information, using the domain-name-servers
parameter.  It can also provide WINS servers, IRC servers (I just
found that out yesterday, and am still boggling), and boot servers for
TFTP.  Anything BOOTP could do, DHCP can do...and, IIRC, it even has
user-defined fields to send anything you want.

Now, the real question is, do the standard linux DHCP clients support
setting up resolv.conf from the DHCP lease information.  I think they
do, but you'd have to poke at the respective man pages to be
sure...and there are 3 or 4 DHCP clients for linux.  I don't use it
myself, so I don't know.

> Second, I assume that changes to resolv.conf are recognized only
> when the connection is created.  Is this correct?

'man 5 resolver' tells us:

     The resolver is a set of routines in the C library (resolve(3))
     that provide access to the Internet Domain Name System.  The
     resolver configuration file contains information that is read by
     the resolver routines the first time they are invoked by a
     process. 

So, when a process starts, it gets resolver information.  This is
independant of any connection.  So, if you change resolv.conf, and
then start netscape, netscape will resolve names OK.  But if netscape
was already running when you change resolv.conf, then it won't.  Make
sense?

And no, I don't know why they didn't name the man page resolv.conf.

=)

HTH.

/mdi

-- 
-- michael d. ivey, lead engineer, applianceware (tm) ------------------
------ realm information technologies  <http://realminfo.com> ----------
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