I have set up a local network and it seems that some of us can use it properly while others can't. The problem seems to be that the local hostnames I setup don't get resolved for everyone. To overview how the network is setup: I am running an Ubuntu 10.01 server using dnsmasq, this server is setup to act as our primary DNS server, configured via our router. dnsmasq is configured using the options of domain-needed bogus-priv I use the /etc/hosts file to determain the hostnames 192.168.1.10 ra.xsi 192.168.1.10 test.xsi From my machine: If I dig the hostnames they resolve properly ; <<>> DiG 9.4.3-P1 <<>> ra.xsi ;; global options: printcmd ;; Got answer: ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 61671 ;; flags: qr aa rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0 ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;ra.xsi. IN A ;; ANSWER SECTION: ra.xsi. 0 IN A 192.168.1.10 ;; Query time: 9 msec ;; SERVER: 192.168.1.10#53(192.168.1.10) ;; WHEN: Wed Nov 9 12:28:34 2011 ;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 40 Ping also works: PING ra.xsi (192.168.1.10): 56 data bytes 64 bytes from 192.168.1.10: icmp_seq=0 ttl=64 time=0.834 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.1.10: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.699 ms ^C --- ra.xsi ping statistics --- 2 packets transmitted, 2 packets received, 0% packet loss round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 0.699/0.766/0.834/0.068 ms And login via SSH works using the hostname. For those that cannot connect using hostnames, if I dig from their machine it appears the name is being resolved, but they cannot ping, SSH or http access the hostname. ; <<>> DiG 9.6.0-APPLE-P2 <<>> ra ;; global options: +cmd ;; Got answer: ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 12554 ;; flags: qr aa rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0 ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;ra.xsi. IN A ;; ANSWER SECTION: ra.xsi. 0 IN A 192.168.1.10 ;; Query time: 8 msec ;; SERVER: 192.168.1.10#53(192.168.1.10) ;; WHEN: Wed Nov 9 12:05:50 2011 ;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 36 I've been banging my head at this and just can't seem to figure it out.