This bug exists in Python 2.3.2, 2.3.3 and 2.3.4. 
socket.gethostbyname is broken on hpux HP-UX B.11.11 
U. This is what I'm getting when I try to call 
socket.gethostbyname('server'):

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "../../test.py", line 2, in ?
    a=socket.gethostbyname('myserver')
socket.gaierror: (8, 'host nor service provided, or not 
known')

I got the same error when I tried getaddrinfo(server, 
port).

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The servername is supposed to be resolved via DNS query to 
get thje ip address. If I use the ip address instead of the 
servername, the function works fine [i.e. 
socket.gethostbyname('x.x.x.x') works fine.]

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Can you investigate this in more detail, and suggest a patch?

If not, it is unlikely that it will be fixed anytime soon,
because the bug is likely specific to the operating system,
and might be even specific to your installation.

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By looking more into this problem, I found that several 
development groups have reported the exact same problem 
with hpux 11.11. The fix for them was to install DNS patch 
PHNE_27796 along with other patches. However, these patch 
did not fix my problem. As a workaround, I commented out 
HAVE_GETADDRINFO in pyconfig.h. This allowed getaddrinfo 
from python distribution to take place as oppose to the 
broken one from HP. This workaround fixed the problem. I'm 
closing this bug as it's apparently not in python nor python 
can fix it.