I can't connect to internet

**OlderThanDirt** · 05-14-2005, 12:28 AM

I am having the same "Could not look up internet address for . . . This will prevent Gnome from operating . . ." error that has been reported by others.

I've read the thread "New to linux, cannot connect to internet" initiated by roy, and have tried several of the suggestions there. If I open a browser, and then try
/sbin/dhclient eth0
the browser will work but I can't start any other program and must reboot.

Any advice (suitable for a newbie) would be appreciated.

My machine's name is paul-cellar. It connects to a Trendnet TE100-S5P switch and thence to a Speedstream 5200 DSL router. There is no network "domain" or "domain controller. My /etc/hosts file has
127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain localhost

Running chkconfig --list| less shows no entries for either dhclient nor dhcp service.

Running chkconfig --list | grepdh gives nothing.

**Tyr_7BE** · 05-14-2005, 02:49 AM

First, to get rid of the popup in Gnome, edit /etc/hosts and add your machine name to the end of that row you gave. Ie, you said your machine name is paul-cellar.

Code:

127.0.0.1  localhost.localdomain  localhost

becomes

Code:

127.0.0.1  localhost.localdomain  localhost paul-cellar

Now what do you mean when you say you can't start any other program? Have you tried launching one from a terminal? Is it EVERY program, or just some? If it's just some, are they programs that use the network? Try this: open up a terminal and issue a "/sbin/dhclient eth0", and then type "gedit" in the terminal. See if an editor pops up. If not, do you get an error message?

**OlderThanDirt** · 05-14-2005, 10:37 PM

Thanks, Tyr_7BE .

Adding the computer name to the end of the hosts entry helped. The Gnome popup disappeared.

I tried opening the browser, an OpenOffice program, and a few others. Sometimes nothing happened and sometimes a box opened at the bottom of the screen saying "Starting XXX" and then disappeared.

After adding the computername to the hosts file as you suggested, I changed the network settings to DHCP-assigned IP addresses and rebooted, Boot took a very long time but when it finished I was able to connect to the internet and run programs.

Thanks!