Netscape unable to locate the server www...

Support knowledgebase (nm_dns_config)
Applies to

SuSE Linux: Versions since 6.0

Symptom: Netscape is unable to find any Internet-Adresses and produces an error

It is not possible to show any websites with Netscape or other browsers. The connection to your ISP seems to work properly (via ISDN or ppp). Netscape comes up with the following error-messages:
Netscape: Error 
Netscape is unable to locate the server www.suse.de
Please check the server name and try again.
and/or:
Netscape: Error
Warning: the following hosts are unknown:
home.netscape.com
home6.netscape.com
internic.net
This means that some or all hosts will be unreachable.
Perhaps there is a problem with your name server?

Cause:

You need to configure at least one accessible nameserver (DNS). All internet-adresses can be achieved by their IP number, e.g. 194.112.123.200. Nameservers are responsible for assigning a name (like www.suse.de) to a unique IP number. A webbrowser (like Netscape) tries to connect to the nameserver to obtain the IP number corresponding to the name and then connects to this number. You can reconstruct this behaviour by yourself:
  1. Establish the Internet-connection
  2. Start Netscape
  3. Enter the adress http://194.112.123.200
This establishes a connection to the german SuSE webserver which is normally accessible via http://www.suse.de.

Solution

The access to nameservers can be configured easily by the use of yastin case of SuSE Linux until version 7.3. From the version 8.0 on please use YaST2. The following example describes the procedure with YaST:
  1. login as root
  2. start yast and change to 'System administration', 'Network configuration', 'Nameserver configuration'.
  3. Confirm the following question with "Yes"
  4. Fill in the IP number(s) of your ISP's nameserver(s) in the first line. If your provider gave you more than one IP number, insert all numbers separated by blanks.
  5. You can leave the second line blank.
  6. Confirm your changes. Leave yast by typing several times.

Keywords: DNS, NAMESERVER, NETSCAPE, INTERNET, MODEM, ISDN, DIAL-UP, PPP, INTERNET

Categories: DNS

SDB-nm_dns_config, Copyright SuSE Linux AG, Nürnberg, Germany - Version: 31. Mai 1999
SuSE Linux AG - Last generated: 15. Apr 2002 by sdb (sdb_gen 1.40.0)