> So my problem, essentially, is that my Linux machine can not seem to > ping a colleague's machine if I include the domain. I asked another > colleague with a Windows box to try pinging > "company-231.companysys.local" and it was able to do so, reporting the > correct IP. ... > Can anyone suggest likely causes? Places I could look? Googling > keeps coming back with ways to setup bind. ;> I'm not sure of the way all this works, but places to look are: /etc/nsswitch.conf (the hosts and network entries) /etc/resolv.conf (do you have a search or domain entry?) /etc/hosts and of course the bind config. The dig command with the @server parameter can tell you if dns can resolv the name (cuts out the libresolv stuff) so you can narrow down the problem: dig @dnsserver.you.want.to.query company-231.companysys.local Or, if you like shorter output: dig +short @dnsserver.you.want.to.query company-231.companysys.local Good luck. In my nsswitch I found some unusual stuff (new to me, anyway): "mdns4_minimal" and "mdns4". Maybe avahi- or zeroconf-related? bjb