NAME
networks —
Internet Protocol network name
database
DESCRIPTION
The networks file is used as a local
source to translate between Internet Protocol (IP) network addresses and
network names (and vice versa). It can be used in conjunction with the
Domain Name System (DNS).
While the networks file was originally
intended to be an exhaustive list of all IP networks that the local host
could communicate with, distribution and update of such a list for the
world-wide Internet (or, indeed, for any large "enterprise"
network) has proven to be prohibitive, so the Domain Name System is used
instead, except as noted.
For each IP network, a single line should be present with the following information:
official network name ip network number aliases
Items are separated by any number of blanks and/or tab characters.
A hash mark (‘#’) indicates
the beginning of a comment; subsequent characters up to the end of the line
are not interpreted by routines which search the file.
Network number may be specified in the conventional
‘.’ (dot) notation using the
inet_addr(3) routine from the IP address manipulation library.
Network names may contain "a" through "z", zero through
nine, and dash (‘-’).
IP network numbers on the Internet are generally assigned to a site by its Internet Service Provider (ISP), who, in turn, get network address space assigned to them by one of the regional Internet Registries (e.g., ARIN, RIPE NCC, APNIC). These registries, in turn, answer to the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).
If a site changes its ISP from one to another, it will generally be required to change all its assigned IP addresses as part of the conversion; that is, return the previous network numbers to the previous ISP and assign addresses to its hosts from IP network address space given by the new ISP. Thus, it is best for a savvy network manager to configure his hosts for easy renumbering, to preserve his ability to easily change his ISP should the need arise.
FILES
- /etc/networks
SEE ALSO
getnetent(3), resolver(3), resolv.conf(5), hostname(7), named(8)
STANDARDS
P. Mockapetris, DNS Encoding of Network Names and Other Types, RFC 1101, April 1989.
Y. Rekhter, B. Moskowitz, D. Karrenberg, G. J. de Groot, and E. Lear, Address Allocation for Private Internets, RFC 1918, February 1996.
H. Eidnes, G. de Groot, and P. Vixie, Classless IN-ADDR.ARPA delegation, RFC 2317, March 1998.
V. Fuller and T. Li, Classless Inter-domain Routing (CIDR): The Internet Address Assignment and Aggregation Plan, RFC 4632, August 2006.
HISTORY
The networks file format appeared in
4.2BSD.