Sensor hostname beginning with a Numeric Character

[rbign]

Is there any way we can set the sensor (NS-3200 | 9.1.5.9) with a numerical character? Our client's naming convention across their entire network (50k+ hosts) begins with a number and doesn't want to change their naming policy just for their IPS Sensors.  We've already raised a SR to Support but they haven't gave a definite explanation on why we can't do the numeric hostname.

Thank you!

[mjesmer]

"The Sensor name is a case-sensitive alphanumeric character string up to 25 characters. The string can include hyphens, underscores, and periods, and must begin with a letter."

Pulled from the 9.2 Network Security Platform Installation Guide - Page 60
https://kc.mcafee.com/corporate/index?page=content&id=PD27457

Short of Developement commenting on your SR with McAfee, this is all we have to go off.

[rbign]

I've received a reply with the Support team with the same info as you have provided, but unfortunately, that does not answer on why we cannot use a numerical character for the beginning of the hostname. We can do it on most, if not all, windows and different linux distros. We even used a numerical character as a the beginning of our NSM hostname, but not the IPS sensors. That does not even make any sense on why.

[rbign]

Yeah it was stated in the product guide, but that doesn't answer on why can't we or why was it designed that way.

[mjesmer]

That is why I said without Development commenting on your SR you won't get the answer you are looking for. Support will just give you the documentation, unless you push for a reason/use case that isn't a one off. I am sure there is a "valid" reason for them not allowing numerical characters to start the name. 

I can from experience and my history at McAfee tell you that most Product Enhancement Requests / Feature recommendations do not even get serious consideration from Development, unless there are a large number of customers asking for it.

[ciaranr]

Hi rbign,

while I don't have any inside knowledge into this decision, it may be possible that the current status is due to the old recommendation in RFC-952. While this has been superceded by RFC-1123, which removed the restriction of the first character being alpha-only, I can only speculate as to the reasoning why our sensor names cannot begin with a numeric character.

--CR