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I know that I can use a tool like NMAP or arp-scan on Linux to identify the IP and MAC addresses of all devices on my local network. I also know that arp-scan will do a MAC address lookup to get the device manufacturer. But is there any set of options on these commands (or any other command) that can tell me the actual device name of the device at a give IP? For example, if "Joe's iPad" is on 192.168.1.113 I want a command to get that name.

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  • Do you mean the hostname ? Or a OS Specific name that you have set ?
    – Lawrence
    Jan 16, 2014 at 1:57
  • @Marc Doesn't your nmap -v -sP 192.168.1.0/24 | grep up. give you host-names? Mine for example gives Host XPS8500.fritz.box (192.168.1.33) appears to be up..
    – Rik
    Jan 16, 2014 at 10:37
  • if you know the dns server you can try nmap -A -v --dns-servers 10.10.10.10 10.20.20.20 where 10.10.10.10 is the dns server and 10.20.20.20 is the target
    – nassim
    Nov 15, 2019 at 1:05

2 Answers 2

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Nmap

Some hosts could simply be configured to not share that information. It should work just like this:

user@host:~$ nmap 192.168.1.113

Starting Nmap 7.00 ( https://nmap.org ) at 2015-12-11 08:45 AWST
Nmap scan report for Joes iPad (192.168.1.113)
Host is up (0.0038s latency).

Not shown: 999 closed ports
PORT      STATE SERVICE
62078/tcp open  iphone-sync

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 41.88 seconds

You can force Nmap to attempt reverse DNS resolution for all targets, by using the following option:

-R (DNS resolution for all targets).

    Tells Nmap to always do reverse DNS resolution on the target
    IP addresses. Normally reverse DNS is only performed against
    responsive (online) hosts.

This might help in some cases. The output will look more or less identical:

user@host:~$ nmap -R 192.168.1.113

Starting Nmap 7.00 ( https://nmap.org ) at 2015-12-11 08:46 AWST
Nmap scan report for joes-ipad.local (192.168.1.113)
Host is up (0.0047s latency).
rDNS record for 192.168.1.113: joes-ipad.local
Not shown: 999 closed ports
PORT      STATE SERVICE
62078/tcp open  iphone-sync

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 42.61 seconds

Either way; you can always parse the output through external tools, such as grep. This can be particularly useful if you're scanning several addresses, or even whole network ranges at a time:

user@host:~$ nmap 192.168.1.0/24 | grep '(192.168.1.113)'

Nmap scan report for Joes iPad (192.168.1.113)
All 1000 scanned ports on Joes iPad (192.168.1.113) are closed
user@host:~$ nmap -R 192.168.1.0/24 | grep '(192.168.1.113)' 

Nmap scan report for Joes iPad (192.168.1.113)
All 1000 scanned ports on Joes iPad (192.168.1.133) are closed

Net-Tools

What you (probably) actually want to do, is this:
*Output will vary, based on OS & software version.

user@gnu:~$ arp 192.168.1.113

Address                  HWtype  HWaddress           Flags Mask            Iface
Joes iPad                ether   a1:b2:c3:d4:e5:f6   C                     wlan0
user@bsd:~$ arp 192.168.1.113

Joes iPad  (192.168.1.113)  at  a1:b2:c3:d4:e5:f6  on   en0  ifscope  [ethernet]
1
  • 1
    you can use arp -a ... to fore a BSD-like output. May 5, 2018 at 15:20
0

Take a look at nmblookup and/or smbutil lookup commands.

3
  • 7
    While this might actually answer the question, it would be better if you cold expand a little and explain how these commands can be used to solve the issue at hand. In any case, as far as I know, both of these tools depend on the smb protocol and there is no reason to assume that will be used on a Linux network.
    – terdon
    Jan 16, 2014 at 2:51
  • @terdon, I guess more appropriate would be to delete this answer and resubmit it as communitywiki so that anybody can edit/add to it. Let me know if that's better. Afaik Apple devices automatically register on smb.
    – Mxx
    Jan 16, 2014 at 5:27
  • 5
    Why? Just add a bit more info on how these programs work, and explain that they only work on the smb protocol. Maybe add an example of how to use them as well.
    – terdon
    Jan 16, 2014 at 12:37

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