wtf: hostid gives '0' as a hostid

Tue Feb 12 16:10:29 PST 2008

saw something today i've never seen before.  on a linux box,
/usr/bin/hostid printed '0' to stdout (plus a newline, of course).
uh...  isn't it supposed to be an eight digit hex number?

i copied hostid from a box on which it was working correctly to /tmp
on the "bad" box.  when i ran /tmp/hostid it sill gave a hostid of 0.
each of these boxes is *supposed* to be a clone at the hardware level.

our environment depends on /usr/bin/hostid on each host working
correctly.  a cursory web search hasn't been enlightening.  has anyone
run into this before?  if so, how did you fix it?

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