hostname curiosity [SOLVED]

[Steve]

---- Steve <zephod at cfl.rr.com> wrote: 
> 
> ---- "Mikkel L. Ellertson" <mikkel at infinity-ltd.com> wrote: 
> > Steve wrote:
> > > When I boot my F9 box it can have one of two different host names
> > > and I would like to figure why this is.
> > > 
> > > One of the hostnames, hp<number> is the name set by the manufacturer
> > > and it's probably in the BIOS. I think that the other one is set via
> > > dhcp. Our network dhcp server is a Windows box. The pattern seems to
> > > be that when I first turn the machine on, it gets the hp<number>
> > > hotsname but if I reboot, I get the dhcp name. I would like to
> > > always get the dhcp name.
> > > 
> > > Any suggestions how on to investigate this?
> > > 
> > The only way I could see the hostname being set by the BIOS is if it
> > did the connection to the DHCP server. (Network boot?) It is
> > possible to set up the DHCP request to request a specific hostname,
> > or the DHCP server to assign a specific hostname.
> > 
> > You can try setting "DHCP_HOSTNAME" in the config file for the
> > interface and see if that helps.
> > 
> > You can also set the hostname in /etc/sysconfig/network.
> 
> I *could* set dhcp to request a specific filename - I do this on my home machine by creating a /etc/dhclient.conf file containing "send host-name "my host name";" - but that wouldn't satisfy my curiosity and besides, the host name really should be set by the dhcp server.
> 
> I'll try adding DHCP_HOSTNAME to /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0. Currently it contains BOOTPROTO=dhcp plus a few other things.
> 
> /etc/sysconfig/network contains
> NETWORKING=yes
> HOSTNAME=localhost.localdomain
> 
> so the system seems to be ignoring that hostname altogether.

Cool! Adding 

DHCP_HOSTNAME=yes

to /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 seems to have done the trick. Now there is a longer pause during booting when it gets to the Setting up eth0...[OK] line so I'm guessing it is waiting a little longer to get an answer from the dhcp server. 
Btw, where are the docs for the ifcfg-eth0 file syntax? There is no man page for it.

Thanks
Steve