From: Bakul Shah <bakul@iitbombay.org>
To: Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com>
Cc: Internet History <internet-history@postel.org>,
COFF <coff@minnie.tuhs.org>,
The Unix Heritage Society <tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org>,
Grant Taylor <gtaylor@tnetconsulting.net>
Subject: Re: [TUHS] [COFF] Pondering the hosts file
Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2021 10:30:40 -0800 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <ACFA5AEB-B17A-4A5B-88CA-ABF611DD1E2E@iitbombay.org> (raw)
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On Mar 11, 2021, at 10:08 AM, Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Mar 11, 2021 at 10:40 AM Bakul Shah <bakul@iitbombay.org> wrote:
>> From https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?hosts(5)
>> For each host a single line should be present with the following information:
>> Internet address
>> official host name
>> aliases
>> HISTORY
>> The hosts file format appeared in 4.2BSD.
>
> While this is true wrt the history of FreeBSD/Unix, I'm almost positive that BSD didn't invent it. I'm pretty sure it was picked up from the existing host file that was published by sri-nic.arpa before DNS.
A different and more verbose format. See RFCs 810 & 952. Possibly because it had to serve more purposes?
> Warner
>
>>> On Mar 11, 2021, at 9:14 AM, Grant Taylor via TUHS <tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org> wrote:
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> I'm not sure where this message best fits; TUHS, COFF, or Internet History, so please forgive me if this list is not the best location.
>>>
>>> I'm discussing the hosts file with someone and was wondering if there's any historical documentation around it's format and what should and should not be entered in the file.
>>>
>>> I've read the current man page on Gentoo Linux, but suspect that it's far from authoritative. I'm hoping that someone can point me to something more authoritative to the hosts file's format, guidelines around entering data, and how it's supposed to function.
>>>
>>> A couple of sticking points in the other discussion revolve around how many entries a host is supposed to have in the hosts file and any ramifications for having a host appear as an alias on multiple lines / entries. To whit, how correct / incorrect is the following:
>>>
>>> 192.0.2.1 host.example.net host
>>> 127.0.0.1 localhost host.example.net host
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Grant. . . .
>>> unix || die
>> _______________________________________________
>> COFF mailing list
>> COFF@minnie.tuhs.org
>> https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
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next reply other threads:[~2021-03-11 18:31 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 28+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2021-03-11 18:30 Bakul Shah [this message]
-- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2021-03-12 10:53 Paul Ruizendaal via TUHS
2021-03-11 17:13 [TUHS] " Grant Taylor via TUHS
2021-03-11 17:29 ` [TUHS] [COFF] " Steffen Nurpmeso
2021-03-11 17:40 ` [TUHS] " Bakul Shah
2021-03-11 18:08 ` [TUHS] [COFF] " Warner Losh
2021-03-11 18:12 ` Clem Cole
2021-03-11 18:21 ` Jaap Akkerhuis
2021-03-11 18:21 ` Nelson H. F. Beebe
2021-03-11 20:05 ` Jan Schaumann
2021-03-11 20:30 ` Henry Bent
2021-03-11 20:42 ` Henry Bent
2021-03-11 21:20 ` Henry Bent
2021-03-11 23:46 ` Richard Salz
2021-03-12 1:15 ` Jeremy C. Reed
2021-03-12 3:27 ` George Michaelson
2021-03-11 20:44 ` Lars Brinkhoff
2021-03-11 21:05 ` Henry Bent
2021-03-12 5:53 ` Lars Brinkhoff
2021-03-11 21:12 ` Ron Natalie
2021-03-11 22:33 ` Jeremy C. Reed
2021-03-11 18:27 ` Henry Bent
2021-03-11 18:18 ` Henry Bent
2021-03-11 18:02 ` Clem Cole
2021-03-11 20:32 ` Ron Natalie
2021-03-11 21:02 ` Bakul Shah
2021-03-11 21:08 ` Ron Natalie
2021-03-11 21:15 ` Bakul Shah
2021-03-12 1:14 ` Mary Ann Horton
2021-03-11 21:20 ` Grant Taylor via TUHS
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