ipnodes Database

The ipnodes database is no longer included in releases after Solaris 10 11/06. In these subsequent releases, the IPv6 features of ipnodes migrate into the hosts database.

The /etc/inet/ipnodes file stores both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses. Moreover, you can store IPv4 addresses in either traditional dotted decimal or CIDR notation. This file serves as a local database that associates the names of hosts with their IPv4 and IPv6 addresses. Do not store host names and their addresses in static files, such as /etc/inet/ipnodes. However, for testing purposes, store IPv6 addresses in a file in the same way that IPv4 addresses are stored in /etc/inet/hosts. The ipnodes file uses the same format convention as the hosts file. For more information on /etc/inet/hosts, refer to hosts Database. See the ipnodes(4) man page for a description of the ipnodes file.

IPv6-enabled applications use the /etc/inet/ipnodes database. The existing /etc/hosts database, which contains only IPv4 addresses, remains the same to facilitate existing applications. If the ipnodes database does not exist, IPv6-enabled applications use the existing hosts database.

If you need to add addresses, you must add IPv4 addresses to both the hosts and ipnodes files. You add IPv6 addresses to the ipnodes file only.

Example 10–3 /etc/inet/ipnodes File

You must group host name addresses by the host name, as shown in this example.

#
# Internet IPv6 host table
# with both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses
#
::1     localhost
2001:db8:3b4c:114:a00:20ff:fe78:f37c   farsite.com farsite farsite-v6
fe80::a00:20ff:fe78:f37c     farsite-11.com farsitell
192.168.85.87   				 farsite.com farsite farsite-v4
2001:db8:86c0:32:a00:20ff:fe87:9aba   nearsite.com nearsite nearsite-v6
fe80::a00:20ff:fe87:9aba     nearsite-11.com nearsitell
10.0.0.177  				 nearsite.com nearsite nearsite-v4 loghost