.\" $NetBSD: hostname.7,v 1.1.1.2 2012/09/09 16:07:45 christos Exp $ .\" .\" Copyright (C) 2009 Internet Systems Consortium, Inc. ("ISC") .\" .\" Permission to use, copy, modify, and/or distribute this software for any .\" purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above .\" copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies. .\" .\" THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND ISC DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES WITH .\" REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY .\" AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL ISC BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, .\" INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM .\" LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE .\" OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR .\" PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE. .\" .\" Id: hostname.7,v 1.3 2009/01/22 23:49:23 tbox Exp .\" .Dd February 16, 1994 .Dt HOSTNAME @DESC_EXT_U@ .Os BSD 4 .Sh NAME .Nm hostname .Nd host name resolution description .Sh DESCRIPTION Hostnames are domains. A domain is a hierarchical, dot-separated list of subdomains. For example, the machine .Dq Li monet , in the .Dq Li Berkeley subdomain of the .Dq Li EDU subdomain of the Internet Domain Name System would be represented as .Pp .Dl monet.Berkeley.EDU .Pp (with no trailing dot). .Pp Hostnames are often used with network client and server programs, which must generally translate the name to an address for use. (This task is usually performed by the library routine .Xr gethostbyname @LIB_NETWORK_EXT@ . ) The default method for resolving hostnames by the Internet name resolver is to follow RFC 1535's security recommendations. Actions can be taken by the administrator to override these recommendations and to have the resolver behave the same as earlier, non-RFC 1535 resolvers. .Pp The default method (using RFC 1535 guidelines) follows: .Pp If the name consists of a single component, i.e. contains no dot, and if the environment variable .Dq Ev HOSTALIASES is set to the name of a file, that file is searched for a string matching the input hostname. The file should consist of lines made up of two strings separated by white-space, the first of which is the hostname alias, and the second of which is the complete hostname to be substituted for that alias. If a case-insensitive match is found between the hostname to be resolved and the first field of a line in the file, the substituted name is looked up with no further processing. .Pp If there is at least one dot in the name, then the name is first tried .Dq as-is . The number of dots to cause this action is configurable by setting the threshold using the .Dq Li ndots option in .Pa /etc/resolv.conf (default: 1). If the name ends with a dot, the trailing dot is removed, and the remaining name is looked up (regardless of the setting of the .Li ndots option), without further processing. .Pp If the input name does not end with a trailing dot, it is looked up by searching through a list of domains until a match is found. If neither the search option in the .Pa /etc/resolv.conf file or the .Dq Ev LOCALDOMAIN environment variable is used, then the search list of domains contains only the full domain specified by the .Li domain option (in .Pa /etc/resolv.conf ) or the domain used in the local hostname. For example, if the .Dq Li domain option is set to .Li CS.Berkeley.EDU , then only .Li CS.Berkeley.EDU will be in the search list, and this will be the only domain appended to the partial hostname. For example, if .Dq Li lithium is the name to be resolved, this would make .Li lithium.CS.Berkeley.EDU the only name to be tried using the search list. .Pp If the .Li search option is used in .Pa /etc/resolv.conf or the environment variable .Dq Ev LOCALDOMAIN is set by the user, then the search list will include what is set by these methods. For example, if the .Dq Li search option contained .Pp .Dl CS.Berkeley.EDU CChem.Berkeley.EDU Berkeley.EDU .Pp then the partial hostname (e.g., .Dq Li lithium ) will be tried with .Em each domain name appended (in the same order specified); the resulting hostnames that would be tried are: .Bd -literal -offset indent lithium.CS.Berkeley.EDU lithium.CChem.Berkeley.EDU lithium.Berkeley.EDU .Ed .Pp The environment variable .Dq Ev LOCALDOMAIN overrides the .Dq Li search and .Dq Li domain options, and if both .Li search and .Li domain options are present in the resolver configuration file, then only the .Em last one listed is used (see .Xr resolver @FORMAT_EXT@ ) . .Pp If the name was not previously tried .Dq as-is (i.e., it fell below the .Dq Li ndots threshold or did not contain a dot), then the name as originally provided is attempted. .Sh ENVIRONMENT .Bl -tag -width "/etc/resolv.conf " .It Ev LOCALDOMAIN Affects domains appended to partial hostnames. .It Ev HOSTALIASES Name of file containing .Pq Ar host alias , full hostname pairs. .El .Sh FILES .Bl -tag -width "/etc/resolv.conf " -compact .It Pa /etc/resolv.conf See .Xr resolve @FORMAT_EXT@ . .El .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr gethostbyname @LIB_NETWORK_EXT@ , .Xr resolver @FORMAT_EXT@ , .Xr mailaddr @DESC_EXT@ ,