LAN question

[Paul Newell]

Nifty Fedora Mitch wrote:
> On Sun, Sep 14, 2008 at 09:56:16PM -0700, Paul Newell wrote:
>   
>> Fedora:
>>
>> Before I switched to F9, all my FC5 machines were happily chatting with  
>> each other through a Linksys WRT54GL but none of them could see the net.  
>> I upgraded one of them to F9 and it sees the net and can ssh to the  
>> others. But the other two machines can no longer ssh into it F9 system.  
>> I tried to play with things to fix it, but the best I could do was kill  
>> the network connection so that the F9 system can't see the other machine  
>> or the net. In other words, I screwed up. Since I can't figure out how  
>> to get the network back alive by restoring prior conditions, I am  
>> resigned to yet another re-install (the price of learning is lots of  
>> starting over...)
>>
>> That being said, I was hoping to get a bit of advice.
>>     
>
> I suspect a change in Zeroconf since things appear mixed.
>
> 	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeroconf
>
> If you have some hosts with 169.254.0.0/16 (link-local) addresses and
> some with private/ public network numbers you have a mix of link local
> and private nets we know what the issue is.  
>
>    "The technique for IPv4 is called IPv4 Link-Local address assignment
>    (IPV4LL) in RFC 3927. However, Microsoft refers to this as Automatic
>    Private IP Addressing (APIPA) or Internet Protocol Automatic Configuration
>    (IPAC)."
>
> The Linksys is the same model I use and I have had no need to make changes
> You might have to reboot it once in a blue moon.  I do keep IP addresses
> below xxx.yyy.zzz.100 for fixed services and let it assign DHCP from 100 up...
>
> There are four interesting network blocks for us common folk:
>      10.0.0.0        -   10.255.255.255  (10/8 prefix)
>      172.16.0.0      -   172.31.255.255  (172.16/12 prefix)
>      192.168.0.0     -   192.168.255.255 (192.168/16 prefix)
>      169.254.0.0/16  -   169.254.255.255 (link-local 169.254.0.0/16 prefix)
>
> Link local sounds like "machines were happily chatting with each other
> through a Linksys WRT54GL but none of them could see the net" to me.
>
>
> --
>   Later mitch
>
>   
Mitch:

I read through the zeroconf wiki link and, as noted in reply to Arthur, 
confirmed that link-local seems to be on the F9 system. I also noted 
that I saw no such info on the FC5 systems and I don't know whether 
Avahi was part of that release.

I am not certain if I am reading the information you provided me 
correctly, but it seems that since I am trying to keep all Linux boxes 
on static adressses (192.168.2.{10,11,12}) and not have the LAN 
controlled by DHCP, I would think I wouldn't be wanting link-local ... 
but I might be completely misunderstanding this. If I could get name 
resolution to work on ssh from Linux box to Linux box even if the 
addresses are DHCP, then maybe link-local is something I should be 
embracing. But since I am really clueless on all this network stuff, I 
am feeling like I have to do static addresses that hostnames are tied to.

I tried to read some of the RFC links and they are way over my head.

I am receptive to trying things different than my FC5 setup, just need 
enough info so I feel that I wearing a blindfold while I do it.

Thanks,
Paul