In this video we take a look at how from an iPad, we can run a terminal command to find out what IP address a website or a Synology NAS is using. As this command will perform a forward or reverse lookup. We found the host command to be useful when configuring DNS server on our NAS.
Note: As iPadOS does not have a terminal, we need to use a terminal emulator to run the command. In this video we used a free terminal emulator called a-Shell. The reason we like using a terminal emulator, is so we can use the same macOS terminal command on our iPad.
Quick reference notes:
- Download and open the a-Shell app
- To find the local IP address of our NAS, or the IP address being used by a website. At the command prompt type.
host [domain name of NAS or webserver]- Pressing Enter on the keyboard to display the IP address of a NAS or web server.
Note: If you try and access a website using its IP address, and the site fails to load. This basically indication that a website is being hosted on a shared server. This is becuase in an instance were a server is hosting multiple websites. There is no way for the iPad to resolve which website is using the single IP address that server has.
- To gracefully close your current Terminal session type:
exit- When you press Enter on your keyboard, the Terminal session will end. This in turn will close the Terminal application.
Reference materials:
- a-Shell website – a-Shell
- mydoodads article – How to setup a Synology NAS – part 37 – Installing and configuring DNS server
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