Ubuntu
avahi package

  1. Bug #327362
  2. Comment #60

Comment 60 for bug 327362

Revision history for this message
Thomas Hood (jdthood) wrote :

Comment #50 described how Mac OS X 10.2 did it. Here is how Mac OS X v10.6 does it (http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3473).

"As long as your network's DNS server is properly configured, you do not have to make any changes on your client Mac.

Host names that contain only one label in addition to local, for example "My-Computer.local", are resolved using Multicast DNS (Bonjour) by default. Host names that contain two or more labels in addition to local, for example "server.domain.local", are resolved using a DNS server by default.

Additionally, Mac OS X v10.6 automatically detects when the local network operator has set up a name server that will answer name requests for a domain ending in ".local". It does this by checking to see if there is a Start Of Authority (SOA) record for the top level domain "local", which is how a DNS server indicates that it claims to have authority over a part of the DNS namespace. As long as the DNS server is properly configured with the required SOA record, Mac OS X v10.6 will detect this SOA record and automatically use this server to look up all host names in the domain."