[NTLUG:Discuss] Host ID

[Steve Baker]

Fred James wrote:
> Well, actually I'm not sure what good that is since I get exactly that 
> same number on each of two Linux machines here (i.e., between us so far 
> we have three machines with the same hostid number).  But, maybe someone 
> else has a better idea.

I guess the big question is "What do you want this for?" - some machines
(SGI and Sun machines for example) have an utterly unique number burned
into a chip somewhere that generates a totally unique ID that's often
used to node-lock software, to verify the machine's identity for maintenance
contract work and things like that.

PC's (in general) don't have that - and software that needs to node-lock has
to use the NIC Ethernet address - which is unique - but changes when you upgrade
or replace your NIC.  The big problem with PC's is that wherever you put that
unique ID code, there is a good chance that someone will upgrade that part
and find that nothing works anymore.

Microsoft try to get around that by tying together your CPU type, your
RAM size, various device ID's *and* your NIC and allow one or two of those
to change and still see this as the 'same' computer...however, that's
notoriously flakey.

I'd bet that the NIC address is 'good enough' for most purposes...so, the
big question is: What is this *for*?

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