Fedora Looks At Changing The Default Hostname For F26 & Beyond

[cen1]

How about suggesting a random name, but allow us to change it?

*ding* *ding* we have a winner

[ElectricPrism]

Scenario one, Create a randomized String


String1 = Color[]
String2 = Flavor[]
String3 = Desert[]

PurpleVanillaCheesecake

RedChocolatePie

This is a example I came up with in 1 minuet.

Alternative 2.

$(whoami)-Fedora-$(hostnamectl chasis)

[stiiixy]

FluffyBunnyCareBearPonycorns!

Obviously there'd be no EXCLAMATION, but,

FluffyBunnyCareBearPonycorns!.raddomain.dude

[nomadewolf]

*ding* *ding* we have a winner

What's my prize?

[starshipeleven]

does it really matter what the hostname is?

Yes, most distros (also Fedora) allow the choice because for many it matters. It's useful nowadays that you can use hostname instead of IP to connect to local network devices thanks to avahi/zeroconf.

[Ericg]

How about suggesting a random name, but allow us to change it?

Thats what they ARE doing. Currently Fedora defaults to "localhost.localdomain" and do not force users to change it. This change simply changes the default to Fedora-$randomNumbers, this prevents duplicates on the network. Users are still free to go in and change it during install.

[sgallagh]

Hi there, folks. Stephen Gallagher here (also known as: The Guy Who Proposed This to Fedora In the First Place)

First, to clear up a few points:

1) Fedora has always allowed the hostname to be changed in Anaconda. It's perhaps not in the most obvious of places (the networking spoke), but it's there. It can also be set via kickstart, of course.
2) The default today is to use a name provided by the DHCP server if it offers a name for that device, otherwise it will fall back to localhost.localdomain (the common case for most personal networks).
3) The proposal was exactly what was described above: change the fallback name to Fedora-XXXXXXXX by default, while of course retaining the ability to change it manually.
4) The specific issue relating to FreeIPA and Active Directory is one of uniqueness: you can only have one machine named "localhost" enrolled in a domain. A user who is unaware of the hostname at all will not know to change it ahead of time.

The thread on Fedora Devel revealed some other issues which need to be considered carefully. One of these is that of privacy: for example, the DHCP client will send the machine's hostname as one of the cues to the DHCP server for acquiring a lease. While this is fine on private networks, there's a valid concern that this might be undesirable on a public hotspot. (This is only one such example; there may be other places where the system transmits the hostname).

With machines commonly defaulting to localhost.localdomain, getting this information tells the recipient little more than that a Fedora-derived machine is connecting. However, the more unique we make the name, the easier it becomes to isolate it to a single system (such as for tracking purposes). It is an open question whether this is an actual problem to worry about or whether it's a drop in the proverbial bucket.

It's also worth noting of course that any manually-chosen hostname will have this same problem, which begs the question of whether it's worthwhile to do anything about it at all. (Or perhaps that the focus should be on not leaking the hostname itself elsewhere, regardless of how it was created).

I hope this frames the discussion better.

[Guest]

Scenario one, Create a randomized String

String1 = Color[]
String2 = Flavor[]
String3 = Desert[]

PurpleVanillaCheesecake

RedChocolatePie

This is a example I came up with in 1 minuet.

Depending on the possible words, this has the potential of generating some controversial names

[sgallagh]

Scenario one, Create a randomized String


String1 = Color[]
String2 = Flavor[]
String3 = Desert[]

PurpleVanillaCheesecake

RedChocolatePie

This is a example I came up with in 1 minuet.

My first pass at this (now abandoned) did something very similar: https://github.com/rhinstaller/anaconda/pull/164/

[GreatEmerald]

Yeap, openSUSE has done that for a while now. (In fact, for as long as I can remember...) Mind you, I always name my devices after their platform. The one I'm writing on right now is "mahobay".