No subject

use telnet to log into the computer is that the case? As suggested
it's a bad idea and may not tell you much. However, 'name or service
not known' sounds to me like a failure to resolve the address you gave
it, telnet to a closed port here gives me:
$ telnet localhost
Trying 127.0.0.1...
telnet: connect to address 127.0.0.1: Connection refused

Are you using a hostname rather than an IP address? The same for ping?
Is ping reporting the right IP address if you're giving it a hostname?
What does traceroute think? Are you able to run nmap against the host?
(N.B. running nmap against someone else's system could be regarded as
unfriendly and get you in trouble, so make sure you can do so first if
unsure.)

-- 
imalone