[mythtv-users] Re: Why only numeric IP addresses work?

[Grant Edwards]

On Wed, Oct 13, 2004 at 11:13:32AM -0400, Isaac Richards wrote:

>>> and setting up an inet_addr stuct, all that's required is to
>>> rip out a couple dozen lines of code and replace it with a
>>> single call to gethostbyname().  That illustrates _my_ point:
>>> why would anybody go to all the extra work required to
>>> explicitly _not_allow_ hostnames?
>>
>> I browsed around the source code a bit, and in some places
>> gethostbyname() is used (so the normal resover libraries will
>> work).  In other places, some Qt "host address" object is used.
> 
> Wait a minute - someone actually _looked_ at the source code?
> That's crazy talk.

Unfortunately, you're pretty much right...

> > >From what I can tell from the Qt documentation, that object can
> >
> > only understand dotted-quad notation.  Apparently, the Qt guys
> > decided to write their own address parser rather than doing the
> > right thing and just calling gethostbyname().  Not only did
> > they reinvent the wheel, they apparently made it sqaure...
> 
> Because just using gethostbyname blocks, and you don't want that in a GUI app.

Good point.  I had forgotten that.  IIRC netscape used to have
an entire separate process/thread that did nothing but do DNS
lookups.

> There is a non-blocking Qt class to handle name lookups.

-- 
Grant Edwards
grante at visi.com