[Dnsmasq-discuss] Question about /etc/hosts and problem with Ubuntu 10.10

[Chris G]

I have a small SoHo LAN on which I run dnsmasq 2.52 on one of the
machines (dps, 192.168.1.2) to provide DHCP and DNS.  There are some
static IP addresses on the LAN and thus the /etc/hosts on the machine
where dnsmasq runs is as follows:-

    127.0.0.1       localhost

    # The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
    ::1     localhost ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
    fe00::0 ip6-localnet
    ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
    ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
    ff02::2 ip6-allrouters
    ff02::3 ip6-allhosts
    #
    #
    # Systems with static addresses, dnsmasq distributes these to the others
    #
    192.168.1.1 vigor 2820n
    192.168.1.2 dps dps.zbmc.eu
    192.168.1.3 hp7310 HPEDDBB7 HP000D9D068F7D
    192.168.1.4 chris mws boat info
    192.168.13.254 2wire BT2700HGV gateway.2wire.net

I'm having a problem with the machine 'chris', 192.168.1.4, since I
upgraded it to xubuntu 10.10 (all other machines are still at 10.04).

After the upgrade something (Network Manager I guess) insists on
changing the /etc/hosts file to the following:-

    127.0.0.1       chris   localhost.localdomain   localhost
    ::1     chris   localhost6.localdomain6 localhost6

    # The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
    ::1     localhost ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
    fe00::0 ip6-localnet
    ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
    ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
    ff02::2 ip6-allrouters

... up until the 10.10 upgrade my /etc/hosts was:-

    127.0.0.1       localhost

    # The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts
    ::1     localhost ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
    fe00::0 ip6-localnet
    ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
    ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
    ff02::2 ip6-allrouters

which worked perfectly.  However with the Network Manager changes the
machine 'chris' doesn't think it has a proper domain and apache2 and
leafnode complain about there not being a valid domain.


So, two questions:-

1 - Are my /etc/hosts files OK (without the Network Manager changes that
    is)?  I.e. is what I have the correct way to get what I want?

2 - Can anyone suggest a workaround to prevent Network Manager
    overwriting /etc/hosts or a way to change /etc/hosts so dnsmasq will
    still work correctly in spite of the Network Manager changes.


-- 
Chris Green