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    Host name help

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
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    • H
      Hammer8
      last edited by

      Hmm...thank you all, but I’m not sure what I need to do. For example, I have a Windows 10 PC called Piano which has a static ip of 192.168.1.33

      I can access its shares by typing //192.168.1.33 in explorer. I would like to access the shares by typing in //Piano instead. I see under Diag/ARP table in pfsense that the hosts which get their ip’s via DHCP has the host name populated, but for those which I assign static IP’s, the host name field is blank.

      Thank you.

      JKnottJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • stephenw10S
        stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
        last edited by stephenw10

        Exactly, so add them as static IP reservations in the DHCP server setup even if they don't actually pull an IP via DHCP.

        Then in the DNS resolved make sure you have Register DHCP static mappings in the DNS Resolver enabled.

        Steve

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • johnpozJ
          johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
          last edited by

          Assign the machine a static via the dhcp server, ie a reservation..

          For example I have a windows 10 machine name i5-win, yes very creative since it a I5 cpu running windows ;)

          dhcpreservations.png

          So via dhcp it will always get that 192.168.9.100 IP, since my domain in pfsense is set to local.lan - the fqdn for this host will be i5-win.local.lan

          Since I have unbound set to register dhcp reservations in dns, I will be able to resolve that via the fqdn.. Since windows will auto add the domain to a query.. I can do just query for the host name and get back the fqdn

          > i5-win
          Server:  sg4860.local.lan
          Address:  192.168.9.253
          
          Name:    i5-win.local.lan
          Address:  192.168.9.100
          

          ping of just host, any box that uses a search suffix for the domain your using will return the fqdn and IP

          root@uc:/tmp# ping i5-win
          PING i5-win.local.lan (192.168.9.100) 56(84) bytes of data.
          64 bytes from i5-win.local.lan (192.168.9.100): icmp_seq=1 ttl=127 time=0.748 ms
          64 bytes from i5-win.local.lan (192.168.9.100): icmp_seq=2 ttl=127 time=0.728 ms
          64 bytes from i5-win.local.lan (192.168.9.100): icmp_seq=3 ttl=127 time=0.632 ms
          

          An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
          If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
          Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
          SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • H
            Hammer8
            last edited by

            Thank you! That did the trick. Appreciate everyone’s help. Out of curiosity, why is it under pfsense, I need to specify a MAC address and with my Netgear router, I didn’t have to? Not a big deal, but will need to change the entry in Pfsense if my hardware changes.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • JKnottJ
              JKnott @Hammer8
              last edited by

              @Hammer8 said in Host name help:

              Hmm...thank you all, but I’m not sure what I need to do.

              If the computer is connected to the network, it should have an address. You can go into the Status > DHCP Leases to find that address. You can then click on the "+", 2nd from right, to add a static mapping. You then set the address you want and give it a host name. When you have done this, the device will have a static address and a host name that you can use.

              PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
              i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel Gb Ethernet ports.
              UniFi AC-Lite access point

              I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • stephenw10S
                stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                last edited by stephenw10

                It's not actually using the MAC address there. Entering it as a static lease is a convenient way of getting the hostname/IP address into the DNS resolver. You could also add those as host overrides in the DNS resolver directly and it would have the same effect.
                Adding it as a static lease means you don't accidentally assign the IP to another device as it's already in table. It also means if that device changes from static to DHCP for some reason it will pull the same IP address.

                Steve

                H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • johnpozJ
                  johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                  last edited by

                  I your client would of been dhcp already, you wouldn't of had to call out the mac - since pfsense would of already known it and you could just clicked the little add button.. in the lease table and put in the IP you wanted the client to use (outside of the dhcp scope)

                  An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                  If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                  Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                  SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • H
                    Hammer8 @stephenw10
                    last edited by

                    @stephenw10 said in Host name help:

                    It's not actually using the MAC address there. Entering it as a static lease is a convenient way of getting the hostname/IP address into the DNS resolver. You could also add those as host overrides in the DNS resolver directly and it would have the same effect.
                    Adding it as a static lease means you don't accidentally assign the IP to another device as it's already in table. It also means if that device changes from static to DHCP for some reason it will pull the same IP address.

                    Steve

                    Hi, I deleted the entries I entered previously under DHCP Static Mappings and re-entered them as host overrides under DNS resolver and it doesn't seem to work. Eg., I can't access the shares as \Piano in Windows explorer. These machines are all part of a WORKGROUP and not part of a DOMAIN so under domain, I entered "local". Is there anything else I need to do? Thank you!

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • stephenw10S
                      stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                      last edited by

                      It has to match whatever they were showing up as in the dhcp leases. I expect that to be whatever the pfSense domain is unless you set something specifically in the dhcp server.
                      Is there some reason you don't want to use dhcp static lease entries for this?

                      Steve

                      H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • johnpozJ
                        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                        last edited by johnpoz

                        Your machine will use a domain to resolve dns.. workgroups have nothing to do with it..

                        In your pfsense what does it say for the domain, see my post above.

                        On your client what does it say.. do an ipconfig /all

                        $ ipconfig /all
                        
                        Windows IP Configuration
                        
                           Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : i5-win
                           Primary Dns Suffix  . . . . . . . : local.lan
                           Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcast
                           IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
                           WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
                           DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : local.lan
                        

                        See the local.lan as the primary domain suffix, and the search list..

                        If you setup a host override for piano.local - then that is what you would have to do a specific dns query for.

                        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                        If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                        Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                        SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • H
                          Hammer8 @stephenw10
                          last edited by

                          @stephenw10 said in Host name help:

                          It has to match whatever they were showing up as in the dhcp leases. I expect that to be whatever the pfSense domain is unless you set something specifically in the dhcp server.
                          Is there some reason you don't want to use dhcp static lease entries for this?

                          Steve

                          Yes, I remote access into these machines and so need a static IP. When you say it has to match the dhcp leases, how can I find what that is? When I go to view the dhcp leases, these machines don't show up...I thought is was because they are set up as static IP's. Note I set these up with static ip's within Windows.

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                          • johnpozJ
                            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                            last edited by johnpoz

                            What does remote access have to do with anything?? When you set a dhcp reservation - that machine will always get that IP.

                            You can set them up on your machine directly if you want - lot of extra work for nothing.. But your host override will work as well as long as your fqdn (fully qualified domain name) is correct and that is what you query for.

                            Here..

                            override.png

                            $ ping piano.local
                            
                            Pinging piano.local [192.168.9.10] with 32 bytes of data:
                            Reply from 192.168.9.10: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=64
                            Reply from 192.168.9.10: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=64
                            Reply from 192.168.9.10: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=64
                            

                            piano.png

                            An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                            If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                            Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                            SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                            JKnottJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • JKnottJ
                              JKnott @johnpoz
                              last edited by

                              @johnpoz said in Host name help:

                              But your host override will work as well as long as your fqdn (fully qualified domain name) is correct and that is what you query for.

                              As I mentioned above, it's very easy to just get a DHCP address, find it in the DHCP leases and change it to a static mapping and provide a host name, all on the same page. Otherwise, you have to determine the MAC address and then configure the mapping.

                              PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
                              i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel Gb Ethernet ports.
                              UniFi AC-Lite access point

                              I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

                              H 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • H
                                Hammer8 @JKnott
                                last edited by

                                Thanks. I get it now. Don't specify the static ip on the pc. Set it to use DHCP and then in pfsense, make it a static ip on the DHCP leases page. Works great! Thank you.

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