How does a linux dhcp client know it's name?

[icebiker <icebiker@ca.inter.net>]

Hi,

I've got a sarge system connected to a DLink D604 router. I'm using  the 
router's dhcp server to assign IP addresses to the system. The network 
configuration is what the debian installer gave me.

Some applications seem to have trouble understanding the network 
configuration. For example, sudo says:

 jvl@flipper:/etc$ sudo aptitude
 sudo: unable to lookup flipper via gethostbyname()

and hostname seems seriously confused:

 jvl@flipper:/etc$ hostname
 flipper
 jvl@flipper:/etc$ hostname -i
 hostname: Unknown host

Also, the router doesn't seem to be able to get the system's name, 
though it can the names of my Windows systems.


Poking around, it seems that gethostbyname() looks at the host.conf and 
resolv.conf files, but those files seem to expect a fixed ip address. 
Also, none of the man pages that I could find (where is resolv+?) seem 
to know about /etc/hostname, which I thought was the way a Linux system 
named itself.

So, I'm missing something here. Is there a way to tell the resolver to 
look /etc/hostname? How does this stuff get tied together?


/icebiker