Linux Mint 14 Hostname Resolution

[quigongren]

Local workstation PCs on my home LAN are unreachable / unresolved by hostname. When I ping a workstation by name, I get "ping: unknown host homeserver1". Same applies for any other host on my network. I've searched all over for a solution to this and even tried some of the suggestions I've found, but none seem to help resolve this.

I am running a new Linux Mint 14 installation on a Windows home network workgroup (called WORKGROUP). I can ping internet domains and local IP addresses, but not hostnames.

I need this in order to use remote desktop to access some of my workstation PCs and do not want to resort to using IP addresses only.

Please help.

[xenopeek]

This may help: http://www.ehow.com/how_12154358_netbio ... buntu.html. I'm not sure though; not using Windows at home.

[altair4]

This may seem like pure semantics but remember that a hostname and a netbios name are two different things. If you can't ping by hostname then you don't have a LAN side DNS server in your network - usually supplied by your router.

But from the sound of it it looks like this is a Samba / SMB question. Samba machines normally find each other by netbios name not hostname although Samba will force the netbios name to match the hostname. You can't ping by netbios name since ping doesn't know what that is.

That was probably more confusing than helpful so see if this helps:
Samba Browsing Problems Checklist: viewtopic.php?f=42&t=88146&start=0

In particular item [3] which forces the netbios name resolution order to point to the only method that is functional by default.

[altair4]

It may be too late but I will give at least one attempt to talk you out of the winbind / nsswitch thing.

Everyone is under the impression that if they cannot ping another machine then that's why Samba can't browse. They are unrelated things. Winbind /nsswitch will add a layer of complexity to your system that has consequences: Adding "winbind" (wins) to resolve windows hostnames slows down firefox: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1496488

I cannot ping another machine in my network but they all see each others Samba / SMB shares - across all 4 workgroups in my LAN.

EDIT: There is an alternate method that you can use if you have no lan side DNS to resolve hostnames and that's mDNS ( Avahi, Bonjour, Zeroconf ). It's already functional in your Mint / Ubuntu / Linux box ( Avahi ) and may be functional in your Windows boxes ( Bonjour ) if they have one of the following applications installed: Safari, iTunes, most of the Adobe apps, or Bonjour Print Services for Windows:

Code: Select all

ping hostname.local

The ".local" makes this an mDNS qualified hostname