Hi David, Thanks for your responses.
I'm going to try to your questions and points all in this one post so it's easier to comprehend. Regarding the 'local' name, i don't know how it came into being (or whether it was deliberate on anybody's part). I sure don't think i created it. Thanks for pointing out /var/lib/dhcp/, and thanks very much for pointing out netstat. My /etc/services is like yours regarding mdns (no surprise there i guess), and also like yours regarding what netstat reveals: udp and udp6 for 5353 so something is trying to use that port. I've subsequently set up ~/.ssh/config so i can ssh to all my machines without '.local'. I don't ping too much, so that's not a problem (but it is a little unsatisfactory). And --- i was wrong about how i have my network laid out. So if anybody stumbles on this thread with a similar problem: The router just connects directly to my main linux machine, and the other three hosts (one linux, two other) are all on a subnet that does not include the router. So their behavior is much more plausible --- they don't need '.local' at all --- the only machine that seems to need '.local' is my main linux machine, but it has two network interfaces, so it's in a unique situation. (And that's why i don't want to be too emphatic about 'local' --- i sure don't think i chose that word, but because i was wrong about describing my network earlier, maybe i did something else and just don't recall it. For example, if 'local' was a drop down in one of the guis i went through, then that might be the origin. And i'm very sorry for leaving a trail of red herrings if so!!! :( ) dan On Sun, Apr 17, 2016 at 1:37 PM, David Wright <deb...@lionunicorn.co.uk> wrote: > On Sun 17 Apr 2016 at 09:42:38 (-0700), Dan Hitt wrote: >> If there's a way to determine if i'm running mDNS on my main linux >> machine i'm certainly interested, but i don't want to be too greedy about >> this. >> Because, after all, maybe it is reasonable that if my main linux >> machine is sending all these packets around it needs more help >> in determining what's on the local network. > > $ grep -i mdns /etc/services > mdns 5353/tcp # Multicast DNS > mdns 5353/udp > $ netstat -n -a -e | grep 5353 > udp 0 0 0.0.0.0:5353 0.0.0.0:* 103 14857 > udp6 0 0 :::5353 :::* 103 14858 > $ > > Cheers, > David. >
