[Closed]help with setting up home network with vm server

[vl1969]

Hello, I am new to CentOS, in fact this is my first setup.
I am building out a home VM/File server for my home network.
I have tried OpenSuse 13.1, Ubuntu 14.04 LTE and finally end up with CentOS 7 setup.
reason I am here is that I do not like CLI do I want a GUI for management of the server and VMs.
and so far oVirt looks like a good candidate even though it is not the easiest to setup initially (comparing to libvirt or cloudmin) but it has a better potential IMHO.

I am having issues in running the network. I am in US, I have optimum online as a provider.
the WAN is coming from outside into optimum modem box than into optimum router (yes the give you the wireless router for free as it is also provides an access point to outside.)
the router than is plugged into switch, where all the machines and the server is connected to.
all setups use router as a DHCP /GateWay and DNS servers

but as such I can not reach any of the machines by hostname, except the ones using the DHCP.
if pc use static connection I can only access it using IP address, host name is not reachable.
can someone shed a light on what is proper way to configure the server so it is reachable via host name?
better yet how to establish a local network domain? as in I set the server domain as "home.lan"
so the FQDN would be "server1.home.lan" but that is not reachable except from the host itself.


so far, I had setup CentOS 7 server minimal install, with KVM and WebMin
created a bridge (br0) on a MB NIC that is working and even reachable from the outside (did some port forwarding on the router) I can reach the webmin interface from local network via IP and from internet via no-ip domain:port

but how do I configure so it can be reached via host name?
I would entertain the idea of setting up the main host as a DNS/DHCP server but not sure if I can do this safely right now. I am not too strong on networking. but with a good howto I might be ok.


Some more info of what I want?

I want a single home server, doing a double duty of a File Server for the household (probably a SAMBA setup)
and an NFS shares for use with VMs and HTPC.
also a VM server running 5-6 VMs of specialized use, like VM for the coach potato+sick beard setup to pre-process my media collection(all of my videos and music is already ripped/downloaded I just want to reprocess them to clean up the naming, file organization. etc. ) if I rip the new cd/DVD I just want to drop them into folder and let the process do what is needed. although I might set up a download-er to upgrade some videos to an HD maybe, but this is not a main goal.

thanks

[gerald_clark]

You need to either add the static machines to your DNS server or add them to the /etc/hosts file on every machine that needs to access them by machine name.

[vl1969]

I was afraid you say that