Setting Hostname after BOOPT/DHCP

[Dave Whiteley <d.l.whiteley@ee.leeds.ac.uk>]

Please,

What is the polite Debian way of automatically setting the hostname
after booting using BOOTP/DHCP.

I have a couple of labs full of machines, all more or less
identical. They are all dual-booted Linux <spit> and XP </spit>.

They are maintained by dumping OS images onto them using a proprietary
product. (This mechanism is chosen and used by others.)

This is working well, except that /etc/hostname is identical on all
the machines. The IP addresses are correctly discovered and set.  

I know that I could write a script that gets the host IP address, and
then gets the name associated with that IP, and then updates the
/etc/hostname; and that I could run this script "somewhere" in the
bootup process, or even during the login process. I am sure that there
is a simpler, cleaner way of doing this, that will not get broken
during updates.

Suggestions please.  I have been looking for docs on the
bootp/dhcp process, but failed to find what I need.

Dave

-- 
Dave Whiteley
d.l.whiteley@ee.leeds.ac.uk
Phone +44 (0)113 343 2059
School of Electronic and Electrical Engineering
The University of Leeds. Leeds, LS2 9JT,  UK