ASP(1) | User Manual | ASP(1) |
asp - find an host IP address by its name
asp [-uv] [-f | [-d dir]
[-e ext]] [-a addresses] [-r
repetitions] [-s send_delay] [-w
wait_time] [-p port] hostname
asp -V
Asp finds the IP address of an Internet connected host. In order to find it, the peer hostname (not the FQDN), and the range of its possible IP addresses need to be specified. Those IP addresses could be simple IP addresses as 127.0.0.1 or "metaip" addresses as 127.0.0.1-20 or 127.0.0.*: the former is a simple way to avoid to type a lot of consecutive addresses, the latter is short for 127.0.0.1-254.
In order to simplify the management of the associations between hostnames and addresses, asp searches in a specified directory a text file containing the possible IP addresses of the looked for host. The name of the text file has to be formed by the hostname followed by an optional extension of your choice.
For example to find the author's dynamic IP address, obviously if I am on line, you can provide my metaip address on standard input with the command:
or you can put my metaip address in a file called atomic in your ~/.asp directory, like this:
echo "195.31.186.1-62
194.166.58.2-18" > ~/.asp/atomic
and then you can simply do:
asp atomic
UDP is an unreliable protocol, therefore there is a chance you will not find the host even if it is on line. Anyway, if you are sure that the peer is on line and asp aware, you could adjust the various parameters until you get a reply. At last you will find the correct settings for your particular needs. This until the RDM communication style will be implemented under Linux.
Obviously the hostname has to be unique among the possible IP addresses: asp will hook to the first correct reply.
Stenio Brunetta <stenio@brunettaeperin.it>
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Steven N. Hirsch <shirsch@ibm.net> for v1.3 bug fix and for
the verbose option.
Colin Phipps <cphipps@doomworld.com> for the tmpnam security issue.
February 1997 | Linux |