The hostname of my linux machine is 'linux1' and the IP address is 192.168.0.169. From my windows machine, I can ping the IP address successfully but when I try to ping 'linux1' I get a message:

Unknown host linux1

I can ping 'linux1' successfully on the 'linux1' box. Do I need to do something to get the hostname registered with my DNS server?

I am running a wireless network with a DLink 713P wireless router.

Yes, you would need to register linux1 with some DNS server. Your windows machine needs to resolve the name into an IP address. Unless it has that information locally, it needs to ask a DNS server for it.

Your linux box can ping itself because you made the appropriate entry in your /etc/hosts file. It sees linux1 associated with an IP address, and therefore, does not need to ask a DNS server.

Is there an easy way to register the hostname with DNS? I am assuming that Windows does this automatically since I did not take any manual steps to do this on my Windows machines and they can be pinged by hostname on all other machines.

The extent of my knowledge regarding DNS is that there needs to be some mapping somewhere between a host name and IP address. That informatino can be locally or gained from a DNS server.

In linux, that information is provided in the /etc/hosts file.

In Windows, the only thing I'm aware of to do somethign similar is setting up printer/file sharing. In doing that, your machine uses an SMB protocol (I think that's the name). When a machine logs on, and is capable of providing shares to other machines, it broadcasts its name on the network, and each machine receiving that broadcast makes a note of that machine name and its IP address. I don't believe that's a true/proper DNS method, but it's results are similar. If you were to set your linux box with Samba, then I'm pretty sure you'd get the results you're looking for.

You didn't mention in your original post whether you could ping your Windows machine(s) from your linux box. My guess is you can't, unless you have an entry for them in the /etc/hosts file.

I guess what I'm suggesting is to install Samba. It's reasonably simple, and it's typically what people with Win/Linux netwoks want (to share files and printers between OSes).

Thanks for your help. I went ahead and put an entry in my HOSTS and LMHOSTS files on my Windows machines for the linux box and all is well now.

Wow, I didn't know those kind of files existed on Windows... learn something new everyday.