Ghost Client Look at LMHOSTS file?

[Migration User]

Hey,

We are trying to deploy the latest version of Ghost Console (11.0.1.1532) and I understand that the client uses multicast to find the server, and then uses WINS to find it as well.

 

We currently are not setup with multicasting on our switches and our network isnt designed for it, and we recently took the WINS servers out.  So...

 

My question is, can we edit the LMHOST file, which the pc's should default to if it cant find WINS to point to our ghost server.  Does the client actually go that far in the discovery process or does it just use those two ways.  It would be helpful to edit this public key to include FQDN or something that can take an IP address for the console but I guess we just arent that lucky. 

 

Thanks for the input.

[Migration User]

At the moment, no the clients do not consult the LMHOSTS file - the process they go through uses pretty much exactly the same code in both DOS and Windows and it isn't set up for that particular thing.

I do plan to make some changes to the way clients and servers do find each other in the next version of GSS, and I hope to be able to made this more transparent for most people.

I'm certainly open to suggestions about specific mechanisms, but given that discovery is already pretty complex, my preference is to concentrate on using more of the mechanisms in DHCP and DNS to resolve this if possible since that would seem to give the most bang for the buck. In particular, I'd have a strong preference for techniques that work for Ghost & the GhostCast server as well as the console clients and server, since they already share a lot of discovery code.

[Migration User]

Nigel,
When do you guys plan on having the next version ready?  Or is that an update you plan on adding other support in?  Having just WINS and multicast for discovery isnt too helpful for alot.  Doing something by DNS or FQDN would be much better for multi-subnet companies that dont have multicast on in routers or a WINS server.  Just wondering.

[Migration User]

I can't give a date for the next major release (and I won't be able to until product management make some kind of public announcement of that). Changes to the discovery process won't be in the next update to 2.0, since the code for that has been frozen.