Slashdot Mirror


DNS Complexity

ChelleChelle writes "Paul Vixie of Internet Systems Consortium guides us on a journey into the sublime details of the domain name system. Although it contains just a few simple rules, DNS has grown into a system of enormous complexity. This article explores the supposed and true definitions of DNS, and shows some of the tension between the two definitions through the lens of the philosophy of Internet development protocol."

7 of 93 comments (clear)

  1. That's the IETF Way by Kadin2048 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well, it was written by Paul Vixie, better known for writing a whole bunch of RFCs ... they're not known for being exactly graphics-heavy, either.

    (Although some of them do have some neat ASCII art.)

    --
    "Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
  2. Re:Public DNS is corrupt, but Private DNS is subli by Rob_Warwick · · Score: 2, Informative

    tv is the country code for Tuvalu.

  3. Re:Dynamic DNS by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 1, Informative

    It quite possibly would - dynamic dns domains have expiry times in the minute or even second range, making caching them impractical. A true domain expires in 24-36 hours.

    TBH I'd rather dynamic dns went away.. it's a hack from the dialup days when people got dynamic IP addresses. Everyone's 'always on' now so dynamic IP is pointless.

  4. Re:Public DNS is corrupt, but Private DNS is subli by bursch-X · · Score: 3, Informative

    Tuvalu's main motivation for selling .tv domains was to get the money together to become a member of the UNO so they can officially get a voice to be heard concerning their country (their islands) basically sinking into the ocean due to global warming and rising sea levels.

    So sometimes politics and DNS might be for a good cause.

    --
    There are two rules for success:
    1. Never tell everything you know.
  5. Re:Dynamic DNS by NickFitz · · Score: 3, Informative

    Everyone's 'always on' now so dynamic IP is pointless.

    I don't know who this "everyone" is of whom you speak, but I'm with one of the biggest ISPs in the UK and they use DHCP; I have no guarantee of what my IP address will be from one day to the next. I could probably pay extra for a static IP, but it's not worth the money.

    If you mean "everybody leaves their home network running at all times so they never lose the IP address they got via DHCP when they first turned their cable modem on", then you're ignoring the effect of network outages, power failure, and the fact that if I'm going away I turn all electrical kit off, as I don't want an electrical fire destroying my home and endangering the lives and property of the other people who live in this building.

    There aren't enough IPv4 addresses for every Internet user; I reckon that, in term of individual users, it's a small minority worldwide who have a static IP address.

    --
    Using HTML in email is like putting sound effects on your phone calls. Just say <strong>no</strong>.
  6. Re:Domain Names sdrawkcaB? by NickFitz · · Score: 2, Informative

    Tim Berners Lee now thinks he got it wrong; he now believes that URIs should have had the form http:com/example/blah/, rather than http://blah.example.com/.

    --
    Using HTML in email is like putting sound effects on your phone calls. Just say <strong>no</strong>.
  7. DNS != BIND by RedHat+Rocky · · Score: 2, Informative

    *sigh*

    Once again, BIND is associated with DNS and I'm not even past the third paragraph.

    Zone transfers are not DNS-related, they are BIND-related! For that matter, the term ZONE is mainly a BIND thing!

    Gah!

    --
    Anything is possible given time and money.