I have no idea what dhcp means, so I don't know why instead of just showing 'Name ~' as the beginning of each terminal line, it started showing 'Name@dhcp-xx-x' as the format of my username. Is this a virus or did I just accidentally change this? How do I undo it?
1 Answer
It is not a virus, nor did you actually change it yourself.
The prompt by default begins with the hostname of your computer. The host name is found by doing a so called "reverse lookup" in DNS of the IP address of your computer.
Every time you connect to a network, you'll get an IP address. The provider of that IP usually determines what the reverse lookup will say. Usually it is your internet provider.
Your ISP has thus chosen "dhcp-xx-x" as the hostname. It probably has some internal meaning to them.
DHCP is the name of a protocol used on networks to automatically deliver IP-addresses (and other configurations) to computers. Seeing this in your hostname typically means that your ISP used DHCP to deliver the IP and accompanying configuration to your computer.
answered Nov 29, 2018 at 15:08
