How to find a file in a computer (using DHCP)

[leojau]

Hi,

I have a working system that is being expanded. Cuurrently the system is using only 1 (one) server and is being expanded to multiple servers.
I need these servers to be "plug and play". They will be identical. They need to operate through DHCP (new IP will be assigned every time it connects to the network).

My problem is:
* I need to develop a software that will identify all the active servers in a specified IP range.

I use Fedora Core 13 for the servers.
The servers have freenx running.

Is there an existing software that will do this job?
Can anyone give me some ideas?
I'm pretty newbie with Linux.

Thanks.

[flyingfsck]

net-snmp auto-discover
Zabbix: http://www.zabbix.com/

[stevea]

nmap --open -sV 192.168.1.* -p 53 # for dns servers

nmap -sP 192.168.1.* # to see then all (mostly)


lot of additional options.

[droidhacker]

Originally Posted by leojau

Hi,

I have a working system that is being expanded. Cuurrently the system is using only 1 (one) server and is being expanded to multiple servers.
I need these servers to be "plug and play". They will be identical. They need to operate through DHCP (new IP will be assigned every time it connects to the network).

My problem is:
* I need to develop a software that will identify all the active servers in a specified IP range.

I use Fedora Core 13 for the servers.
The servers have freenx running.

Is there an existing software that will do this job?
Can anyone give me some ideas?
I'm pretty newbie with Linux.

Thanks.

Ok... this seems like a fun little project.

First, there is no need for machines to get different IP addresses every time they start. You can give them consistent addresses within the address pool. DHCP isn't the place to perform load distribution, DNS is a better choice.

Obviously, you can't have all identical servers, since one server must be acting as a DHCP server. Without this, your whole idea must fall apart. This server should also be running a DNS server.

I suggest setting up your dhcpd.conf to establish a client class for your servers. You can use DDNS to associate those with your DNS server and use short timeouts and a load distribution scheme in your DNS server to hand out server IP addresses to client machines.

http://ntrg.cs.tcd.ie/undergrad/4ba2.01/group8/DNS.html

In this way, when a server happens to be brought online, the DHCP server will recognize it as a server, register its IP address with the DNS server, and when clients request the "server" by name, they will receive a list of IP addresses in a varying order.

As an example, run "dig google.com" and observe its response.

[leojau]

Thanks droidhacker for your answer.

I managed to find the active computers in my network using nmap and awk combined to export those ip's to a file o variable.

About the DHCP... is set through the router and that's how it should be! i developed a way to find my servers using ssh and cat to retrieve some specific info.

Thanks everyone