[http] wget: unable to resolve host address `http'

I am getting this strange thing on my Ubuntu 12.04 64-bit machine when I do a wget

$ wget google.com

--2014-07-18 14:44:32--  http://google.com/

Resolving http (http)... failed: Name or service not known.

wget: unable to resolve host address `http'

I have encountered this problem earlier when I got it for any web pages (and not http), which required me to add my nameserver to /etc/resolv.conf.

However, here that doesn't seem to be the problem, instead it is recognizing http as something different. Any advise?

I figured out what went wrong. In the proxy configuration of my box, an extra http:// got prefixed to "proxy server with http".

Example..

http://http://proxy.mycollege.com

and that has created problems. Corrected that, and it works perfectly.

Thanks @WhiteCoffee and @ChrisBint for your suggestions!

I have this issue too. I suspect there is an issue with DigitalOcean’s nameservers, so this will likely affect a lot of other people too. Here’s what I’ve done to temporarily get around it - but someone else might be able to advise on a better long-term fix:

1. Make sure your DNS Resolver config file is writable:

   sudo chmod o+r /etc/resolv.conf

2. Temporarily change your DNS to use Google’s nameservers instead of DigitalOcean’s:

   sudo nano /etc/resolv.conf

Change the IP address in the file to: 8.8.8.8

Press CTRL + X to save the file.

This is only a temporary fix as this file is automatically written/updated by the server, however, I’ve not yet worked out what writes to it so that I can update it permanently.

remove the http or https from wget https:github.com/facebook/facebook-php-sdk/archive/master.zip . this worked fine for me.

If using Vagrant try reloading your box. This solved my issue.

The DNS server seems out of order. You can use another DNS server such as 8.8.8.8. Put nameserver 8.8.8.8 to the first line of /etc/resolv.conf.