[Techtalk] network failure help!

[Telsa Gwynne]

On Thu, May 13, 2004 at 10:21:30PM +0530 or thereabouts, Devdas Bhagat wrote:
> On 13/05/04 21:19 +1000, Kathryn Andersen wrote:
> <snip>
> > > Something in the defaults changed for the laptop?
> > 
> > Or the desktop?
> Your laptop has been on another network, where parameters may have
> changed. As you have indicated till now, there have been no changes in
> the desktop's network environment.
> 
> Oh, and if you don't have tcpdump, there is ethereal (and the command
> line client, tethereal).

I missed the start of this thread. But looking at the subject line
and just that snippet... 

I once took my little laptop somewhere else, plugged into an
office network, and was told "We use DHCP here". Unusually, I
had rarely used DHCP. Everyone else uses the damn thing, but I
haven't a clue about it still. I had a resolv.conf and a hostname 
that worked for me at home. So I used "pump" (a RH app of the time:
I am not sure it's still the default) to "sort all the DHCP stuff out", 
admired the now-sorted network, stayed for ages, and went home.

By the time I plugged the laptop back in at home, I had 
completely forgotten about this little jaunt. As you do.
Ahem. And the wretched thing would _not_ talk to the net. I 
checked my firewall. I checked the home firewall. I checked 
the wireless card. I  swapped the wireless card. I pored 
over bugzilla to see whether I had found yet another problem 
with the wireless card and the kernel-pcmcia card. I begged
an ethernet card off my husband with promises not to break it
like I did the last one (don't ask). I did everything I could 
think of.

Eventually I realised that it was still trying to look up 
every hostname on the nameserver in that office. Behind the
office firewall. Which was saying "bog off". 

(There is an option to pump which does not overwrite your
/etc/resolve.conf. Like so many things, this is something I
learned after it would have been useful to run it.)

So if your laptop has been travelling with you, I would 
check what network it thinks it is connecting to. :) 

Apologies if this is all completely off the mark.

Telsa