file sharing, screen sharing printer sharing

[Tim]

On Fri, 2015-10-23 at 07:26 +0200, Antonio M wrote:
> Funny because when I fired up the computers I could use name for
> resolving remote computer, but only for a while.

How are you doing name resolution?

For small LANs (e.g. three computers at a home), it's easy enough to set
the IPs to fixed addresses, then write entries into each PCs host files.

e.g. Like this example (IPs, domain name, short hostname)

127.0.0.1    localhost.localdomain   localhost
192.168.1.1  basement.localdomain    basement
192.168.1.2  lounge.localdomain      lounge
192.168.1.3  workroom.localdomain    workroom

If you use DHCP, then you really need to configure the DHCP server so
that it always gives the same machine the same IP each time.  Otherwise,
your list gets out of synch with reality.

For larger LANs, you really want a DNS server to do the name resolution,
so that there's a central point of configuration, instead of having to
hand configure each PC, and update each PC with any changes.

Some routers let you program their DHCP server, but they don't put data
into their DNS server, so that it could answer queries.  Others do.
Mine doesn't.  So I switch off the DHCP server in my router, and run a
DHCP and DNS server on a computer, and run them so the DHCP server
reprograms the DNS server, as computers join the LAN.

Avahi/ZeroConf does some kind of broadcasting technique - computers
joining a LAN announce themselves, and requests from computers to other
computers are similarly rather ad-hoc.

Things like Samba can sort-of work things out amongst each other, but
only for their own protocols (e.g. SMB file sharing, SMB printer
sharing).  When a computer connects to their LAN, they talk amongst
themselves, figure out which is the most powerful (perhaps fastest
computer), which one has been running longer, etc, and make it the
master.  It does name resolution for Samba, but for nothing else.  If
another computer joins the LAN, they go through that election process
again, and that can seriously disrupt things for a long time (back in
the Windows days, that could be 15 minutes any time there was a change).
You were in for serious chaos if the master computer went offline.

Without some consistent method of name resolution (such as above),
you'll have problems using machine hostnames on a LAN.  So, back to the
question at the start of my reply:  How are you doing name resolution?

-- 
tim at localhost ~]$ uname -rsvp

Linux 3.19.8-100.fc20.i686 #1 SMP Tue May 12 17:42:35 UTC 2015 i686

All mail to my mailbox is automatically deleted, there is no point trying
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George Orwell's '1984' was supposed to be a warning against tyranny, not
a set of instructions for supposedly democratic governments.