Q:

Can only ping hostname but not a domain

Ubuntu Gnome 13.10
What I can do:

ping hostnameX

Response: PING hostnameX.domain.local (10.0.0.1)

nslookup hostnameX

Response: Name: hostnameX.domain.local; Address: 10.0.0.1
Response coming from: Server: 127.0.1.1; Address: 127.0.1.1

nslookup hostnameX.domain.local

Response: Name: hostnameX.domain.local; Address: 10.0.0.1
Response coming from: Server: 127.0.1.1; Address: 127.0.1.1

What I CANNOT do:

ping hostnameX.domain.local

Response: ping: unknown host hostnameX.domain.local

This happens with all hostnames within the domain
This is my /etc/resolv.conf
# Dynamic resolv.conf(5) file for glibc resolver(3) generated by resolvconf(8)
#     DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE BY HAND -- YOUR CHANGES WILL BE OVERWRITTEN
nameserver 127.0.1.1
search domain.local

I already tried the same with dnsmasq disabled, without success...
UPDATE: I also tried some other distros (debian and opensuse), and they all have the same problem. So it looks to me as a general network problem, but what exactly...
Any clues?

A:

While trying to join the windows domain with LikeWise, I found a note on this page in the troubleshooting section, which states to remove 'mdns4' entry from the 'hosts:' part in /etc/nsswitch.conf when trying to join an AD domain with a .local syntax.
I did this and suddenly I could ping (and therefore also access) FQDNs within the .local domain ...
A second source  is describing the same problem and sollution

