[lug] HOSTNAME question

[Arlan Ramsay]

I once thought I understood enough about how this worked.

I am using attbi.com for my ISP, and have one of their cable modems.
This worked with no problems for more than a few months.  I had an
IP address that changed, but not often.

Recently, when startx is setting up, I get a message box that says
the hostname is bad and gnome won't work properly; some or all hosts
may not be accessible, or words to that effect.  I am able to contact
my department machine on campus, read e-mail, run xdvi and gs as well
as a TeX front-end editor.  I am able to download my mail from
mail.attbi.com, and reach every web site that I have tried to reach.

Now for what I can't do.  The most important at the moment is that I
can't print from netscape, just an ascii file using lpr, or a dvi file
using dvilj (HP1100).  The complaint is that dhcp-xxx-xxx is a bad
hostname.  For starters, I don't know how it got set to that.  I had
another name in /etc/hosts.

Please just direct me to something that will help correct my ignorance.
I am not asking for detailed instructions on this list.

Thanks,

Arlan Ramsay