Linux - NetworkingThis forum is for any issue related to networks or networking.
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nsswitch.conf has a line like this:
hosts: files dns
When I try to resolve a hostname that is NOT in DNS, but I have
the hostname in my /etc/hosts file, it will not resolve. If I telnet
to that same hostname, or ping it, it works fine. I have tried
moving the resolv.conf file to a different name, thinking that would force nslookup to use my /etc/hosts file, but that didn't even work. Any ideas? Thanks,
"Nslookup is a program to query Internet domain name servers."
The reason nslookup does not work for hosts not in DNS is that it is specifically designed to query name servers. So if you have a host defined in /etc/hosts but not defined in your DNS, nslookup will error with Non-existent host/domain.
It's true that nslookup does query name servers, most of the time. However, if you specify in your /etc/nsswitch.conf file that
you want "files" to be queried too - like so:
"hosts: files [NOTFOUND=continue] dns"
nslookup is supposed to look at the /etc/hosts file first.
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