localhost or LAN addresses in /etc/hosts

[Derek Broughton]

Bart Silverstrim wrote:

>>Now if you let a Router set your
>> ip numbers it will do it but not the same way all the time. You add
>> another item and ALL ip numbers can change.
> 
> Depends on the router. The part that differentiates how it works is
> the DHCP server software. You CAN tell your DHCP server, if it
> supports it, to always give a specific MAC address a specific IP
> address just like you can configure it to hand out an address for a
> specified period of time, and DNS servers are able to tie a specific
> record to a specific IP.
> 
> If your router is bargain basement then yeah, it'll seem random if it
> lacks features. But it can most certainly be done, and in many cases
> if the feature is there the user just never bothered to configure it
> so they're using the defaults.

Not to mention, most DHCP servers will reassign exactly the same address 
to a device every time it asks, provided the address pool is large 
enough that it doesn't need to recycle them.  This isn't guaranteed, but 
it is extremely likely.
-- 
derek