How do I make my client machine name w/IP address visible to the network

[eddie]

Mac gurus I request your help,

I am putting together a small network with 2 clients & 1 server all running Panther 10.3.8. The server is running DNS & Open Directory/LDAPv3.

Although my clients are not DNS servers, is there any way to do a lookup on their static IP addresses in order to resolve the machine name? From the server, using the Network Utility and typing in the IP address of either of my clients, I get a message:

server can't find " " .in.addr.arpa: NXDOMAIN

So, my server doesn't know the name of either of my clients. Also neither client knows the name of the other client. Only the clients know the name of the server and vice versa (since reverse DNS lookup is enabled).

This leads into my more relevant question. On both of my clients, in the ftp.log file, I get entries that look like this:

Date Time localhost ftpd[369] FTP Login From ? as username (class:real, type:real)

when one client ftp's into the other client.

If the server ftp's into the client then I get:

Date Time localhost ftpd[369] FTP Login From DNS.server.com as username (class:real, type:real)

which looks like a complete log entry (ftp source machine & user are identified).

So, I need to find a way to make my machine name and associated IP address visible to all of my machines on the network for proper logging. How do I do this? BTW, my private network isn't connected to the outside world (Internet or elsewhere).

Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks,
Ed

[eddie]

"Only the clients know the name of the server and vice versa (since reverse DNS lookup is enabled)."

I misstated this. It should be that only the clients know the name of the server and it's IP address.

Anyway, all I needed to do was just update my hosts files on each machine. Now my logs all reflect system accesses by the correct machines (IP addresses and machine names) on the network.

Thanks.
-Ed

[Raven]

Just out of curiosity, how did you update your host file ?

[eddie]

Just open up your hosts file on each machine and add line items which contain the IP address and machine names of all your computers on your private network. There can be at most one space between the IP address and the machine name.

If you had three machines, you'd add the IP addresses followed by the name:

192.168.1.10 alien
192.168.1.11 predator
192.168.1.12 dracula
.
.
.
.

[voldenuit]

Then again, you have a big honking BIND and a GUI for it on your server, so you don't really need to tinker with the clients, even if it might be easier, given the scale of your network :D .

Also note that name resolution has changed quite a bit from one revision to the next, so this trick won't necessarily work with older versions of OS X.

[weltonch777]

All you should have to do is set up your DNS server, and then tell all the computers to use that server as there DNS server. I've heard it's pretty easy with the server software. (You can set it up on a regular OS X install, but you got to the zones by hand.)

[eddie]

All you should have to do is set up your DNS server, and then tell all the computers to use that server as there DNS server. I've heard it's pretty easy with the server software. (You can set it up on a regular OS X install, but you got to the zones by hand.)

Actually, I am using DNS. My clients authenticate to the DNS during login using LDAPv3. The clients themselves are not domain name servers though. So for client<-> client communication, say via rlogin or ftp, your logs won't reflect the name of the machines initiating the session. Just the IP address will be identified in the logs (like in ftp.log). Modifying your hosts file provides machine name resolution for the IP address. The machine name will then show up in the logs.

-Ed