On 17/12/2019 13:55, Andrei POPESCU wrote:
On Lu, 16 dec 19, 10:14:55, David Wright wrote:On Mon 16 Dec 2019 at 12:03:58 (+0530), tv.debian@googlemail.com wrote:One of the PC is serving various services to the LAN, some bypassing the router for load/performances reason,Fair enough. (I do that between hosts using IPv6 over Cat5, and have been scolded here for it.)this PC is carrying an up to date version of the hosts file.But does it need to? If your router runs a DNS server (you say it does), it can provide that (DNS) service to the PC that's providing the various other services.Resolving hostnames via hosts file could be significantly faster than using the router's DNS server.
It is, especially if the router is overloaded or switched off/rebooting ;-) .
It's not one hosts file on every machines on the network, it's one hosts file with every machines on the LAN registered in it on one of the node on the LAN.… which just means there are two machines needing the up-to-date hosts file: the server-PC that avoids disturbing the router, and the router running a DNS server. Still one more than necessary?In the classic client-server topology the server doesn't need the complete hosts file. Only the client(s) need(s) an entry for the server in the(ir) hosts file[1]. Exception would be of course, if the service provided by the server requires accessing other systems (backup server?).
You win the guessing contest, backup server with server initiated backups.
[1] This is probably known by most debian-user subscribers, I'm just making sure we are talking about the same thing. Kind regards, Andrei