Bonjour-based multicast DNS on Windows 2000

Multicast DNS is convenient for local hostname resolution within a home network. On Windows, Apple's Bonjour library provides an implementation, but the latest version (2.0.2) requires Windows XP SP2 or higher. Bonjour 1.0.6 works on Windows 2000 but requires some additional steps before installation will complete successfully.

After initial installation is complete, install Windows 2000 SP4 (W2KSP4_EN.EXE).

Install update rollup 1 for Windows 2000 SP4 (Windows2000-KB891861-v2-x86-ENU.exe, see knowledge base article #891861). If this update is not installed, Bonjour installation will fail with an "Entry Point Not Found" error when running mDNSResponsder.exe:

The procedure entry point HeapSetInformation could not be located in the dynamic link library KERNEL32.dll

If this error occurs, click OK and then click Cancel to stop the Bonjour installer, since the error will keep occurring and installation will never complete.

Install Windows installer 3.1 (WindowsInstaller-KB893803-v2-x86.exe, see knowledge base article #893803).

Install Bonjour 1.0.6 (BonjourSetup.exe, also known as version 1.0.106).

When the Bonjour installer tries to install Apple Software Update, the following error will occur:

Module C:\Program Files\Apple Software Update\ScriptingObjectModel.dll failed to register. HRESULT -2147024769. COntact your support personnel.

The warning dialog gives the options of Abort, Retry, and Ignore. If you select Abort, Apple Software Update will be uninstalled, but Bonjour installation will continue normally. Ignore will continue with the Apple Software Update installation with no apparent ill effects (although I am not planning to use it to keep my Apple software up to date). See this thread on Apple's support community which suggests that Apple Software Update isn't supported on Windows 2000 (suggesting Abort is the best response to the warning dialog).

Once installation was complete, I was able to resolve local hostnames with multicast DNS.

C:\>ping -n 1 otherhost.local Pinging otherhost.local [192.168.1.2] with 32 bytes of data: Reply from 192.168.1.2: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=128 Ping statistics for 192.168.1.2: Packets: Sent = 1, Received = 1, Lost = 0 (0% loss), Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds: Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms