How would I change server name? 1

[tstormchaser]

Hello all,
I'm trying to create a script (with virtually no scripting experience) to convert the /etc/hosts file to reflect a new name for the server. Any ideas on how to go about doing that? Any info would be much appreciated. Thanks.

 

[LKBrwnDBA]

Use vi

(man vi)


----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The person who says it can't be done should not interrupt the person doing it. -- Chinese proverb

 

[KenCunningham]

Which OS? Regardless, you'll probably also need to make several other changes to get this to work.

 

[tstormchaser]

This is on a Unix machine running Solaris 7. I could do it using vi but that takes a while and we are going to be constantly changing the name of the machine so I'd like to script it so it can be done quickly each time. Thanks

 

[stefanwagner]

assuming you change the name of server 1.2.3.4 often:

sed 's/^1.2.3.4.*/1.2.3.4\tnew.name.here alias/' /etc/hosts

but this isn't changing the file itself.

#!/bin/bash
name=$1
aliasname=$2
ip=192.168.1.1
cp /etc/hosts /etc/hosts.backup
sed 's/^'$ip'.*/'$ip'\t'$name' '$aliasname'/' /etc/hosts.backup > /etc/hosts

Errorchecking (missing arguments) is left as an excercise to you

seeking a job as java-programmer in Berlin:

http://home.arcor.de/hirnstrom/bewerbung

 

[SamBones]

It's not just [tt]/etc/hosts[/tt] you'll need to change. Also look for a file called [tt]/etc/hostname.<dev>[/tt] where [tt]<dev>[/tt] is the network device. This will have a single entry that is the hostname. This must correspond to the primary IP for the machine in the [tt]/etc/hosts[/tt] file.

In other words (assuming your network device is an "hme"), the following commands would do it (borrowing from stefanwagner's script)...

#!/bin/ksh
NEW=${1}
IP=192.168.1.2
DOMAIN=.mydomain.com
TIMESTAMP=$(date '+%Y%m%d_%H%M%S')

cp /etc/hosts /etc/hosts.${TIMESTAMP}
sed "^/^${IP}.*/${IP}\t${NEW}.${DOMAIN} ${NEW}" /etc/hosts.${TIMESTAMP} > /etc/hosts

echo ${NEW} > /etc/hostname.hme0

This will allow the new name to survive a reboot. Without it the networking will break.

Hope this helps.