Best DNS Service With API Access?

netaustin writes "My company runs quite a few media websites, mostly on Drupal, and about half on ec2. We have a good server setup with ec2 which allows us to route requests through Pound, a cluster of Varnish servers, then a cluster of Apache servers. We manage 50 domains (one per state) like this. Problem is, anytime things change, we have to manually adjust DNS for all 50 states, which is very boring and usually causes negative side effects too as we can't ever adjust all 50 DNS entries at once. We'd like to just change DNS providers and be done with it, but there are a lot of options, and I don't often shop for DNS services. I use EveryDNS for my personal domains, but I don't think they provide an API and it'd feel a little dishonest to reverse engineer the forms on their site since they're an esteemed donations-based service. I wouldn't feel bad about doing that to DNSPark, but they have a CAPTCHA image accompanying their login form, so goodbye DNSPark. I found a couple services that seem to do what I'm looking for, but they both feel a bit Microsoft-y and since I only want to change once, I want to get this right. Advice?"

Comments

DynDNS

[rho]

DynDNS.

That was easy.

Re:DynDNS

[crush]

Yeah. One of the most reliable and ethical operators in the business.

This seems like an appropriate link.

Re:DynDNS

[oskard]

Also be sure to check out Dynect!

DynDNS also offers another service, more business class. It has a MUCH more robust API, offers Failover, Load Balancing, Anycast, etc. Multiple users, node-based permissions. 37Signals, Mozilla, and RackSpace use Dynect. Highly recommended, give them a call!

http://dynect.com/technology/developers.html

http://dynect.com/features/api.html

Re:DynDNS

[rho]

Yeah. One of the most reliable and ethical operators in the business.

This should be emphasized. DynDNS is both reliable and ethical, and have been for a long time. Indeed, since before they went commercial. When they were non-com, you could get unlimited custom DNS services for a $30 donation. Guess what? When they went commercial they honored that pledge. I still have a number of "never expires" services because of this.

Seriously, it's not worth dicking around with DNS. Get it done right the first time.

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Think posting this twice was enough? Maybe you should post it one more time just to see how little the mods pay attention.. http://ask.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=975011&cid=25146311

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually I have had two accounts 'vanished' by DynDNS now and would never use them again, including one that has been with them for about 8 years first using their dyndns service and more lately (over the last few years) using their staticdns service. Both appear to have been clobbered by their 'stuff must get updated at least every 30 days' policy [1]. Which of course makes utterly no sense for a staticdns service. The staticdns account was for a domain with a PR of about 5 (it was on the air and highly linked-to for over seven years...), so I was understandably upset to see it suddenly vanish off the air one day with no warning whatsoever.

Totally unimpressed, I would never, ever touch them for things I cared about again.

[1] Read the first couple of sentences of the second paragraph on this page:
https://www.dyndns.com/account/resetpass/index.html

Re:DynDNS

[ishobo]

You should have gotten your own domain, not the host sitting on their domain, and used the CustomDNS service. I have an account that has been inactive for over a year and it is still there. CustomDNS domains will never expire if you have been with them since the begining when they were free; all those domains were grandfathered and remain free of charge.

Totally unimpressed, I would never, ever touch them for things I cared about again.

With the free DynamicDNS service, you get what you pay for. If the infrastructure is that important to you, pay for the account.

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

With the free DynamicDNS service, you get what you pay for. If the infrastructure is that important to you, pay for the account.

Rubbish. The post was a response to how 'ethical' and 'excellent' their service was. The simple fact of the matter is that the domain was well known and used as a dyndns domain when DynDNS offered it as a free service - no doubt as a loss leader to encourage others to take up a pay-for service. Once the domain is well known, how exactly do you suggest that it just get 'changed' to another domain? Email and link rot are insoluble problems in this case. More fool I for relying on their 'integrity' and 'service' for them to actually continue to do what they said they would do, or, at least, to have the courtesy of sending me an email before summarily deleting an account that had been with them for seven years.

Re:DynDNS

[ishobo]

You depended on a free service that had limitations for a critical function of your web and email. I am not sure why you decided to use the DynamicDNS service instead of CustomDNS unless you did not want to pay for your own domain. I can understand not wanting to spend any money but you got exactly what the service offers. DynamicDNS has always had the 30 day rule. That is what the word dynamic means. An update client could have been used; the IP address does not have to change but the record needs to be refreshed. You needed to upgrade to the premium level in order to remove the auto expire, and the upgrade was a onetime fee many years ago. Did you not read the account details before signing up?

The old ml.org asked for donations, which did not work out too well. The premium level is how DynDNS was going to make some cash in the begining because it actually costs money to host servers.

Re:DynDNS

[oskard]

Calm down, Slashdot borked the first time.

Re:DynDNS

[bemenaker]

That is the terms of service on the free yourname.dyndns.com accounts. I have used DynDNS to manage my domain names for 8 years now and the only thing I do is sign in once a year or every two years and buy another year or two of service. They have never given my one bit of problem, and they update their records extremely fast.

Re:DynDNS

[wr0ngway]

Last time I checked dyndns strictly forbid using a bot to scrape and do a form submission, which is your only option with them if you want to do any more than basic IP->Host mapping. I've had very good luck with nettica - they have a complete SOAP API for all aspects of DNS entry manipulation. I wrote a ruby gem for this api so I could use it from within my rails/ec2 deployment framework

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

So you're moaning about the free service with the 30 day rule when you could have just paid for a proper DynDNS account? Right. Another happy DynDNS customer NOT expecting to be given everything for free.

Re:DynDNS

[jsight]

Actually I have had two accounts 'vanished' by DynDNS now and would never use them again, including one that has been with them for about 8 years first using their dyndns service and more lately (over the last few years) using their staticdns service. Both appear to have been clobbered by their 'stuff must get updated at least every 30 days' policy [1]. Which of course makes utterly no sense for a staticdns service. The staticdns account was for a domain with a PR of about 5 (it was on the air and highly linked-to for over seven years...), so I was understandably upset to see it suddenly vanish off the air one day with no warning whatsoever.

Totally unimpressed, I would never, ever touch them for things I cared about again.

[1] Read the first couple of sentences of the second paragraph on this page:
https://www.dyndns.com/account/resetpass/index.html

This is absolutely true... and they don't just suspend it with a warning, they just flat out and immediately delete. Giving everyone your IP address would be less painful than dealing with those people.

Re:DynDNS

[jsight]

You depended on a free service that had limitations for a critical function of your web and email. I am not sure why you decided to use the DynamicDNS service instead of CustomDNS unless you did not want to pay for your own domain. I can understand not wanting to spend any money but you got exactly what the service offers. DynamicDNS has always had the 30 day rule. That is what the word dynamic means. An update client could have been used; the IP address does not have to change but the record needs to be refreshed. You needed to upgrade to the premium level in order to remove the auto expire, and the upgrade was a onetime fee many years ago. Did you not read the account details before signing up?

The old ml.org asked for donations, which did not work out too well. The premium level is how DynDNS was going to make some cash in the begining because it actually costs money to host servers.

I understand what you are saying, but it doesn't change the problem in any way. If they suspend an account like this and say "you won't have to deal with suspensions if you help us out a little", that is one thing. When they just delete it completely, as if it never existed and then say "tough, you were relying on our goodness and we ain't that good mister", then I say I'll never give you money. :)

Re:DynDNS

[Bob Uhl]

I don't know so much about 'ethical' anymore. Their free service now expires monthly or so, with only a five-day warning. One of these months I'm going to be on vacation for a week and when I return will discover that my domain has expired:-(

Re:DynDNS

[CyprusBlue113]

I'm sorry but you clearly read and understood the limitations, and then proceeded to completely ignore them in design. This was completely your fault, and blaming the company for it just proves how incompetent/irresponsible you are. I hope I never have the misfortune of any of my systems depending on you.

Re:DynDNS

[ag3ntugly]

I have a free account with dyndns, and they always send me an email warning me that I need to log in before a certain date or my account will dissappear, like they do for every free account. I let it slip once, but it was my fault entirely because I knew it was getting near the end of my 30 days. If you can't be bothered to check your email and login to a website once a month to keep a rather useful free service active, then you sir are a bum.

Re:DynDNS

[asvravi]

so I was understandably upset to see it suddenly vanish off the air one day with no warning whatsoever.

DynDNS always sends me warning notices by email before they expire the account. It cannot vanish with no warning unless it is through your own negligence.

Re:DynDNS

[kv9]

I don't know so much about 'ethical' anymore. Their free service now expires monthly or so, with only a five-day warning. One of these months I'm going to be on vacation for a week and when I return will discover that my domain has expired:-(

just have a dynamic dns entry that updates itself every <less than one month>.

this happened to me already. I had a 7 year old account with them which expired because a dynamic DNS entry updated itself only when the PPPOE connection was made to one of my providers -- which, oddly enough, is rock solid and only reconnects once every 2-3 months. so I just force the updates every other week. this way the account stays enabled.

ps: I have my own domain, I don't depend on DynDNS entirely, but they are nice to have as a free backup.

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

So it's their fault you: - Can't read - Don't read - Ignored the TOS - are an ignorant whiner

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

That is what the word dynamic means

Obviously you aren't as familiar with the DynDNS service offerings as I was, nor did you read my post very carefully:

Which of course makes utterly no sense for a staticdns service.

For a very long time they offered hosting 'static' IPs (ones that they explicitly told you *not* to try updating with the ddclient tool) on their subdomains. So, you could start with a dyndns address on their subdomains 'for fun' and then if your IP address updates were few and far between, they 'strongly encouraged' you to move to their staticdns service, which was the same thing, but you updated the IP whenever required through their web interface (ie, almost never). Obviously there was *never* any indication of a timeout on such a service, as it simply *wouldn't make any sense*. And, in fact, I trucked along quite happily in this mode for many years, often not even logging in to my account for years at a time.

I never, ever, received any correspondence from them that their service offerings had changed and the staticdns service was no longer valid, and I never, ever received any email informing me my 8-year-old account was about to be deleted.

That is not the mark of a trustworthy organisation, no matter what auspices you are using their services under. Remember: *they* offered the staticdns service as a valid option for their customers and *they* then changed the rules of engagement without any notice and nuked the account. Untrustworthy.

Re:DynDNS

[ishobo]

Obviously you aren't as familiar with the DynDNS service offerings

I have used them since they opened the doors. I passed on the DynamicDNS offerings and took the CustomDNS. I did read your post. Parhaps I was being a bit too sarcastic. I apologize for that.

Remember: *they* offered the staticdns service as a valid option for their customers

You are not their customer.

My initial reply about depending on a free service still stands. People that depend on a free service from a business, no matter what the past operational status was like, have no right to compain when it fails for whatever reason. I would lump all these offerings into the best effort category.

If DynDNS was taking your money and doing nothing, then you would be a customer with a gripe.

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

You have forgotten what this thread was about, let me remind you:

One of the most reliable and ethical operators in the business.

A company which advertises and says one thing, and then does another thing, is not ethical, regardless of whether the 'thing' involves money or not.

I'm not whinging about having a free toy taken away, I'm making a point about relying on a company that says one thing and does another. And to my mind, the greatest test of that integrity and commitment to honour ones word is when money *isn't* on the line to keep them honest. And they failed it.

Re:DynDNS

[ishobo]

Please, stop now. You are turning an anthill into a molehill. I have used DynDNS as a paying customer for years and the service has worked great. Your free service was working for 8 years and then went south.

honour ones word

Produce the guarantee of service. If DynDNS was unethical they must have promised something. The reality is they promised nothing. Not even the CustomDNS service has a promise of reliability.

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Produce the guarantee of service.

::rolleyes::

The last resort of the desperate. You sound like one of those people who tries to shut down reasonable debate by demanding that everything said is cited, no matter how mundane. Let me guess, you have a copy of the terms of service for every website you've ever signed up for at the time of signup... No? Thought not.

Re:DynDNS

[ishobo]

The last resort of the desperate.

The claim was made that DynDNS was unethical (and unreliable) because they failed to deliver on their promise. I would like to find out what they promised. I can tell you they have no promise of any service unless you get the optional SLA (available for CustomDNS and SecondaryDNS).

Let me guess, you have a copy of the terms of service for every website you've ever signed up for at the time of signup

I have copies of the ToS for all the services where I pay money.

Re:DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Did anyone bother to look at the core of the problem? One domain per state? That's just stupid! Don't do that! Problem solved.

Re:DynDNS

[egon]

If you buy their Account Upgrade (at a whopping $11.50 a year), they won't expire. Seems like a small price to pay to me. *shrug*

http://www.dyndns.com/services/upgrades/

Re:DynDNS

[egon]

DynDNS's enterprise version (Dynect) does this as well: http://www.dynect.com/features/api.html

Seems to work pretty well for me.

diy??

[sholdowa]

Why not run your own??

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

>Why not run your own??

Apparently the article submitter isn't competent enough to do this on his/her own: Why else would he/she submit something so obviously mission critical to Slashdot?

I *hate* seeing articles such as these on Slashdot: They fall into the "do my job for me" category, and should be tagged as such... only, now days, there are *so* many people on Slashdot lacking basic networking skills, it's almost moot: Hell, articles such as these generate traffic/revenue for Slashdot (to which I am contributing, of course), simply because of that fact. I imagine that such are the second highest traffic/revenue generator, right behind the "RIAA/MPAA"-type articles.

My advice: If you can't figure out a viable method to accomplish what you need, using the skills and knowledge you possess, perhaps you should *hire* someone that can? And, learn from them, as they are doing it?

Slashdot: News For Wannabes, Stuff That Matters To Them.

Captcha: bitterly

Now THAT is a nice one.

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

dammit AC!!! Stop being so social and get back to work!!!

Re:diy??

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"My advice: If you can't figure out a viable method to accomplish what you need, using the skills and knowledge you possess, perhaps you should *hire* someone that can? And, learn from them, as they are doing it?"

That's what HE was hired for.

Re:diy??

[NETHED]

I know replying to an AC won't do much, but I just feel like it, and have not much else to do right now.

Begin Rant...
Slashdot was _the_ site for breaking news a few years ago, and sites would be regularly slashdotted, etc. Now, blogs have taken over, and push out news MUCH faster than slashdot. I think slashdot has the ability/potential to become more of a community. I used to read the comments of slashdot for more insight, as there are truely intelligent people on this site that leave comments, but lately, the S/N ratio has gone bad.

Stories like this are (I think) an attempt to bring back the good S/N ratio. No, slashdot no longer breaks stories, nor does it need to, the slashdot community has probably read about the articles somewhere else, and now comes here to discuss them. Yes, people flame, and there are many FPs, but thats slashdot, and it adds a little something.

So when I read this story, I read it because I'm looking to learn something from the comments. I think thats the direction the slashdot community is going towards.

End of Rant...

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

Stories like this are (I think) an attempt to bring back the good S/N ratio. No, slashdot no longer breaks stories, nor does it need to, the slashdot community has probably read about the articles somewhere else

You must be new here.

There are two orders of magnitude more users of /. than when I signed up. The only thing that's changed in that time is that there is much, much, much more support and sympathy for MS Windows. Some articles are interesting, some are not, some are dups. Live with it.

Do you also expect every page of pr0n you browse to get you off?

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking from the choir, it should be emphasized that /. is probably unique for the wide range of scientists and technicals who comment.

That said, /. has definitely slid on the newness of reports. It's not that the blogs are faster, it's that /. now posts stories one to three weeks after everyone has read it on the BBC. Used to be within plus-minus two days of mainstream reporting. We lose a lot go good potential commenters because the 'news' is now something they've discussed last week, so they flick to the next item.

Re:diy??

[Lennie]

I wouldn't mind helping or the company I work at (the last would be for pay, maybe the first one as well).

Re:diy??

[evilviper]

Slashdot was _the_ site for breaking news a few years ago,

Err, umm, not so much.

Sure, they weren't too far behind, but being first was NEVER the motivation behind /. I can recall numerous times they waited for DAYS after some major event before picking the best of 100,000 submissions to finally post.

and sites would be regularly slashdotted, etc.

The internet has bigger pipes, as do providers.

There are now numerous large 3rd parties that are happy to offer central hosting services of large images, videos, and the like, each with more bandwidth than god (Youtube, Blogger, Flickr, etc.).

And yes, it does seem like even fewer /.ers RTFA.

Now, blogs have taken over, and push out news MUCH faster than slashdot.

There have always been other sites out there that would get the stories first. That's not what blogs have made possible. Now that EVERYONE has their own blog, it's fairly easy to find one that EXACTLY matches the category of content YOU want. However, /. allows customization so that you can stay here and still only get the stories you want... or at least it would work that way if someone would teach Samzenpus to properly categorize stories, esp. "Ask Slashdot" (yes, I know it's ironic that this is one of the few he properly categorized) so I don't have to read half the mindless crap that is going up on the front page these days.

I used to read the comments of slashdot for more insight, as there are truely intelligent people on this site that leave comments, but lately, the S/N ratio has gone bad.

Quite true. For some reason, the most moronic tripe that has been covered in the first line of TFA, and other idiocy, is constantly getting modded up. Ditto for mindless memes. I guess there's next to no-one offering insight anymore, or at least the vast majority are more interesting in mindless ranting about how much they hate Blu-ray, that only jokes get points, and this place slowly turns into Fark.

Stories like this are (I think) an attempt to bring back the good S/N ratio.

No. Stories like this, and all the others, are an attempt to bring in more eyeballs and page loads. /. has been drastically dumbed down over the past year +, so it's all become scare-tactic political stories, software release announcements, and non-technical stories about what product has the best market share this week.

So when I read this story, I read it because I'm looking to learn something from the comments.

As it always was. But even when some story is ideal for technical discussion, such as wireless internet access over unused TV spectrum, Dirac 1.0 being released, etc. the summary most of the time gets twisted every which way to make it all about politics/patents/etc., and trying to push the buttons of the readers, rather than promting technical discussions. THAT is what's been killing this site and keeping the old "community" on the sidelines.

But enjoy drinking from that firehose. Maybe /. can pull a few more eyeballs away from digg.

Re:diy??

[Sorthum]

No, I see where the AC is coming from. At $DayJob I'm an email admin. Seeing more and more small businesses going the Google Apps route, or outsourcing their infrastructure just rubs me the wrong way. It seems like the new solution for everything is "outsource it to Google" or one of the other "big names" in services these days. The problem is that this approach just serves to make EVERYONE dependent upon one particular provider. Assume Google breaks, goes away, etc-- how many sites that you visit daily would simply cease working? It's the "all your eggs in one basket" problem that just didn't exist when you had to be clued to run a server / site...

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

My advice: If you can't figure out a viable method to accomplish what you need, using the skills and knowledge you possess, perhaps you should *hire* someone that can? And, learn from them, as they are doing it?"

If I'm hired to do a job, then I will do that job. I'm not your teacher, stop hovering over me, asking dumb questions. Go take a coffee break, while I do my job.

Re:diy??

[I.M.O.G.]

Things going bad "lately" and yearning for "the good old days", is a common fallacy of logic - it's easy to fall into, welcome to the in-crowd.

Since thats out in the open, we can talk about something progressive rather than dwelling on how things went bad. You are the master of your own S/N ratio... Customize your preferences and you can control how moderations are weighted, and the level at which you browse.

Slashdot has given us a robust system to control viewing preferences and moderate commenting - use the tools provided, you'll thank yourself for it.

Re:diy??

[alta]

There are technical and business reasons NOT to run your own DNS, even if you are capable. I'm using PAID DNS services from companies that specialize in DNS to save cost. One example is a dnd service that watches for my websites to go down and redirects to what's left up. It will also send people to the server that's geographically closest. Sure, I could pay a few hundred a month for some colo'd servers around the internet. Then either buy some expensive DNS software to do this for me, or try to roll my own with something off the shelf.

ORRR I could pay $100/month and I have the above features served up by a dozen servers around the world.

Don't forget microsoft's DDOS mistake they had when they had all their DNS servers on one subnet. Taking down that subnet meant ALL their websites were unavailable.

Shit, this was an AC I posted to... damn, I hate wasting my time.

Re:diy??

[MikeBabcock]

All too often that's exactly how these situations work. Hire someone to do a job that they think they know how to find the people to do.

I run tinydns for the record, to host my DNS entries. Can't imagine why I'd get someone else to do it.

Re:diy??

[ckaminski]

You sound like the I imagine the old power company salesmen did before consolidation of the power industry turned into a near monopoly in this country (USA). I have maybe one or two outages a year, I consider that a pretty damn good SLA considering I get some nasty storms where I live.

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone seems a tad bitter. Did slashdot users not do your homework for you and you failed 1st grade math. awwww

Re:diy??

[chrylis]

Perhaps because you want a globally-distributed DNS system, similar to Akamai's content system? Because you need to be able to do automatic provisioning of devices that are then going to wander around the country and need dynamic DNS? Or maybe you need DNS-level failover for your distributed servers.

(I run tinydns myself, but there are plenty of reasons to hire someone else to do jobs like DNS.)

Re:diy??

[pooh666]

Maybe he isn't such an idiot after all? I mean most of the BS going on these days with DNS is related to Linux morons who think they know what they are doing because they can get BIND running. It also accounts for a lot of outages and a lot of job security for said morons.

Re:diy??

[Just Some Guy]

Apparently the article submitter isn't competent enough to do this on his/her own: Why else would he/she submit something so obviously mission critical to Slashdot?

In fairness, I've asked questions on Slashdot that I'm technically competent to research on my own, but I want some real-world information about the alternatives. For example maybe one CPU specs faster than another but has huge heat problems that aren't apparent in the datasheet. Or suppose I were looking to start using either MySQL or PostgreSQL but wasn't sure of the differences because the feature lists look similar. That's when asking for advice makes a lot of sense, because you're looking for information that just isn't readily available any other way.

In this particular case, it sounds like the submitter did his homework but wants to hear about experiences other people have had in the same field. That sounds like a decent question to me.

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

> Apparently the article submitter isn't competent

no no these are slashvertqueries

We now get various dubious comments recommending suppliers.

Re:diy??

[nabsltd]

You can do both

I run my own primary DNS server, but there are times that machine needs to be down, while the service machines are not. But, nobody could get to anything while the DNS server was down unless they had the name in their cache.

So, I signed up with DNS Made Easy for $15/year and get 3 DNS servers as secondary DNS, but those three are really many boxes around the world. For not much more, you can have them host all your DNS. They don't have API support, though, so it's not for the original question poster.

Re:diy??

[Sorthum]

Sure, but email isn't 1. regulated, 2. supported nearly as well as the power infrastructure, 3. a service people depend upon for life or death situations.

Re:diy??

[ckaminski]

A)if having power is the difference between life and death, I have my own generator. (which i think is just bolstering your point)

B) Email is orders of magnitude less complex than the power network.

Maturation will come, and in 10 years, there will probably be two or three major providers. Gmail.com, Exchange.Microsoft.com, and Yahoo.com
Okay, that's silly because that's already true to some extent... the idea is that in 10 years we may instead *ALL* be using one of these than using some in-house cobbled together miasma of sendmail/imapd/exchange.

or maybe it'll all be filtered through webmail.doj.gov.

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

I know replying to a /. post won't do much, but I'm not doing anything right now since I'm knitting a sweater, so...

Slashdot was _the_ site for breaking news a few years ago,

More like 10 years ago, or is that what you mean by "few". You/we must be getting old...

Now, blogs have taken over, and push out news MUCH faster than slashdot.

Actually news aggregators like reddit, digg, ...

I don't think I'm going anywhere with this but this sure was some nice meta-discussion. I like to come on here and read these insightful comments.

ps. Oh yeah, GP AC was right, these stupid "do my work for me" articles are getting really annoying because of their triviality.

Re:diy??

[Anonymous Coward]

My goodness. I can't even begin to express how completely and totally I disagree with you on this.

Asking someone else in your community is often the first step to find answers. That's part of "doing your job and finding a solution". You need to know where to look and where to ask.

Claiming that this is not the right approach is complete and utter BS.

Need to find a solution? Use a search engine and/or ask the community. That's how it goes. I see absolutely nothing wrong with posting this question here.

It has NOTHING to do with "do my job for me". He is merely asking for a recommendation, not for someone to write all the code that uses the API he is looking for.

Seriously, get real.

Re:diy??

[sbeckstead]

Pompous asshat much!

Re:diy??

[sbeckstead]

Ask San Francisco how doing it the other way worked out!

Re:diy??

[walt-sjc]

That's why you don't run A DNS server, you run DNS ServerS, preferably on different networks. And it's easy. If you are Colo-ed, you usually can use secondaries from your hosting company, and get away with a single server (I still would run 2, but that's me.)

This AskSlash question is ridiculous. Anyone with more than 2 months networking experience can do it in their sleep. Modifying DNS is also trivial. An API? Sed, or 3 (readable) lines of perl. 'Nuff Said.

Re:diy??

[MikeBabcock]

Which is exactly why I love tinydns -- just rsync the data file over to any other servers I host, grep for the appropriate domains if I so choose, and voila, updated live DNS service a-la-carte.

Run tinydns on every machine that has a public facing interface and you've got replicated DNS on all the machines that your customers can see anyway. Besides, unlike some other programs, it uses minimal memory to run.

Run a master?

[The Lesser Powered O]

How about running your own master DNS server, and having your provider slave from that.

Re:Run a master?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't mind running your own master DNS server like this poster recommends, DNS Made Easy has a very cheap and very redundant IP anycast based DNS service that we use for all corporate sites. For dollars a month you could have access to their nameservers, which run all over the world. Other services offer similar enterprise DNS functionality, but comparing performance with price, we haven't been able to find a better deal yet.

Re:Run a master?

[Charles Dodgeson]

Me, too. (That means "mod parent up")

You can use DNSpark (whom I use) or other providers as slaves. Your master doesn't even need to be publicly accessible, just as long as you allow the appropriate zone transfers. This way you can have your own little scripts that generate the zone files on a host you fully control, while having the world query those professionally managed servers.

Re:Run a master?

[WuphonsReach]

How about running your own master DNS server, and having your provider slave from that.

That's the ideal way to do it. Setup your own master server using BIND or whatever, and you get the best of both worlds. You can script access to your DNS server entries, make updates however you want to, and make it as secure as you want to.

Then let the DNS provider simply serve as secondary servers for your DNS domains. Even if your primary DNS server is down for maintenance, the NS records on your domains are pointing at the DNS provider's pool of servers which are geographically separated.

(Alternately, you could try a service like DNSMadeEasy, which allows you to make API-style updates to your DNS entries. Unfortunately, security is a bit thin and you have to hard-code usernames and passwords.)

Re:Run a master?

[Sentry21]

to heck with zone files, set up something like PowerDNS and set it up with a database backup. Do one update query and push out to the slaves. PDNS is also quite snappy, and configuration is far less arcane compared to Bind - in five minutes I had an authoritative, non-recursing DNS server which was not vulnerable to the Kaminsky vulnerability (even if it did recurse). It does things same, logs sanely, and doesn't make me feel like a clueless newbie like Bind does (even after ten years of adminning DNS servers).

Check it out, it's worth it.

Re:Run a master?

[Sentry21]

err. Database backEND. Silly iPhone text correction.

Re:Run a master?

[nullchar]

What sort of load can the DB backend handle? Does it use caching? There's a DLZ-bind mod out there, but it executes at least one SQL query for every DNS query; which can't handle even moderate load.

Re:Run a master?

[Richard_at_work]

Out of interest, who would you go to for DNS glue records? Acting as primary domain servers for domains isn't as easy as setting up named/powerdns and plugging those records into your registrars 'Domain Servers' fields - you need DNS glue from someone above you in order for those DNS servers to be valid.

Or has stuff changed since I last did this a few years back?

Re:Run a master?

[Anonymous Coward]

"who would you go to for DNS glue records?"

If really needed, your DNS registrar will do.

"you need DNS glue from someone above you in order for those DNS servers to be valid."

No, you don't.

"Or has stuff changed since I last did this a few years back?"

No, it hasn't.

You only need glue records... when you need glue records. For a NS that means only if the name server for a domain happens to be within the same domain (so NS for example.com is for instance ns.example.com). On the typical scenario DNSs will be something like ns1.mycompany.com, ns2.mycompany.com and they will serve i.e. onestate.com, othercompany.com and the like. No glue records involved.

Re:Run a master?

[jsoderba]

If you run a non-public master with public slaves running BIND, load should not be an issue.

Re:Run a master?

[Lorens]

What sort of load can the DB backend handle?

Enough.

Does it use caching?

Yes.

There's a DLZ-bind mod out there, but it executes at least one SQL query for every DNS query; which can't handle even moderate load.

That's their problem. PowerDNS rocks. No more pesky start-up times, no more wondering if the syntax is OK so everything can start up again after a reload, let client have a web interface to his zone using simple SQL...

Re:Run a master?

[Anonymous Coward]

... and doesn't make me feel like a clueless newbie like Bind does (even after ten years of adminning DNS servers).

If you're struggling with something as basic as configuring bind after 10 years, you probably shouldn't operate anything more complex than an toaster.

Re:Run a master?

[aevans]

If you keep a copy of all public DNS records in the world on 10 year old hardware with SQLite, it shouldn't be a problem.

Re:Run a master?

[macdaddy]

No offense, but if after 10 years you still haven't figured out Bind then maybe there's a reason... greenhorn. ;-)

Re:Run a master?

[nullchar]

If you run a non-public master with public slaves running BIND, load should not be an issue.

I am actually doing exactly that. Yet with over a hundred thousand zones, even the refresh time-outs and notifies kill DLZ-bind.

Re:Run a master?

[nullchar]

Possible, but highly unlikely. We get 30M DNS queries per day.

Re:Run a master?

[NerveGas]

Since DNS info would (usually) change quite infrequently compared to the frequency of DB updates, it makes more sense to simply write a script which dumps out the database when changes are actually made.

I do that to maintain quite a large number of domains (incidentally, with some having state-based subdomains as the OP mentioned). Running an RDBMS query for DNS seems pretty silly to me in nearly all cases, and in the few cases where it's not... there's probably a better way to solve the problem.

Re:Run a master?

[kayditty]

I don't think you got the point at all. I really doubt he meant to set up your own authoritative server, but rather just to implement a limbo master and transfer the zones to someone managing a professional DNS service, affording you control, and not the pesky timeouts that would come with having your unreliable master as the primary authoritative.

CNAMEs?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are all your domains hosted on the same set of servers? Could you CNAME the 50 domains to a smaller subset of domain names, and then you only have to change the A records of that subset whenever you have a change?

Re:CNAMEs?

[Wowlapalooza]

Are all your domains hosted on the same set of servers? Could you CNAME the 50 domains to a smaller subset of domain names, and then you only have to change the A records of that subset whenever you have a change?

I second this idea.

I'd also point out that you can ease your DNS transitions by carefully planning a "drawdown" of the TTL values of your records prior to the actual change and/or setting up HTTP redirection on the legacy addresses, redirecting to the new location, during the interval of time in which the new DNS information is still replicating and/or resident in DNS caches.

Re:CNAMEs?

[CerebusUS]

The trouble with EC2 and CNAMEs is that you cannot CNAME a base domain.

So you can easily cname www.example.com to whatever you need, but you cannot cname example.com at all.

The better solution (as noted below) is Amazon's Elastic IP offering. Which is free if it attached to a running EC2 instance.

Re:CNAMEs?

[Lennie]

Just set up a redirect from example.com to www.example.com and never change that. You can move www.example.com around any way you want. It also works better with google indexing.

Re:CNAMEs?

[nullchar]

Even a web-based redirect from example.com to www.example.com still needs a valid A record for the host: "example.com".

I do agree that for search indexing, you want to either HTTP/HTTPS redirect www.domain => domain or vice versa.

Run your own dns servers .... try powerdns

[brainchill]

It sounds like it's time to run your own dns servers. For what you're trying to do I recommend powerdns with either a mysql or postgres backend. You can do massive updates with regular sql update syntax very quickly and anything that can talk mysql can update it ... perl, php, ruby, etc ... you name it.

Re:Run your own dns servers .... try powerdns

[abigor]

If you indeed do need to run your own dns servers, then I second the PowerDNS recommendation. Having a proper sql backend is just paradise compared to the flat files of, uh, a certain other dns server that should be killed off. It's also worth noting that PowerDNS splits the authoritative server and the recursor into two separate daemons, which is quite a nifty idea.

Re:Run your own dns servers .... try powerdns

[Lennie]

It's not nifty to split authoritative and recursive, it's sane (security).

Re:Run your own dns servers .... try powerdns

[ScrewMaster]

It's not nifty to split authoritative and recursive, it's sane (security).

Why can't it be both?

"media-based company"

[perlchild]

Are we talking any sort of budget here, or does it have to be free?

Quite a few places will charge a nominal per-year fee for dns, and provide good uptime...

A lot of those are the places you register the domains from, and they make more money on registrations than dns service, but provide both.

Please provide details

Re:"media-based company"

[Anonymous Coward]

Quite a few places will charge a nominal per-year fee for dns, and provide good uptime...

Could you be more specific?

Re:"media-based company"

[ckaminski]

Zoneedit.com

Re:"media-based company"

[perlchild]

http://www.enom.com/

Nettica has been good to me

[Anonymous Coward]

I've used Nettica APIs from OSX and Linux and never had a problem. They have multiple API interfaces and are quite reasonably-priced. http://www.nettica.com/Support/Developers.aspx

EveryDNS or NearlyFreeSpeech.net

[Anonymous Coward]

EveryDNS provides a "secondary DNS" service. If you can set up your own primary server, EveryDNS will clone it.

NearlyFreeSpeech.net has an API to control DNS records.

Re:Most people I have ever met or seen

[Anonymous Coward]

You sound like you've had a long drive home. How about posting in the relevant forum next time, m'kay?

zoneedite.com

[Anonymous Coward]

zoneedit.com

It has an API. Its free for personal use, and the catch is that someone like you, who uses lots of domains, would have to start paying some money.

Anyway, Its what I use for tying my domain to a dynamic IP, and I can update via a script. Its just a wget of a certain webpage with the variables set correctly (domain identified, and my password I think)

Might be what you are looking for. Good luck.

MyDNS

[rawg]

You can always run your own DNS server on a slice somewhere using MyDNS. I've had really good luck with it for over 5 years.

Elastic IPs?

[andrewl6097]

You could also leave your DNS static and use EC2 Elastic IPs to shift things around on the backend (you did mention you were using EC2).

Re:Elastic IPs?

[CerebusUS]

Yeah, that's what I don't get. Amazon's Elastic IPs are free as long as there's a host running that they are assigned to. Plus they have an API for re-assigning them on the fly. Just assign them to the front end pound box and be done with it.

Re:Dynect by DynDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

before giving them a call, prepare to be floored by dynect's outrageous costs

FreeDNS

[Chabil Ha']

FreeDNS I've been using them for a few years. Updating the DNS info can be done in a single click for all domains. They have a few free update clients, or you can use their API to write your own client.

Re:FreeDNS

[almightynayr]

afraid.org will do everything he wants and then some, been using them for over 5 years now with no problems. check it out

Re:FreeDNS

[Alpha232]

Ditto to this, with the infrastructure you seem to have, maybe you might offer something in trade. I see the chance to build a better mousetrap here.

Re:FreeDNS

[sgbett]

i'll lend my voice to the freedns supporters. Had 6 or 7 domains with around 30 or so subdomains for going on 6 years. Been rock solid, really good web interface, with DNS config options I never even heard of (I'm a DBA I just about get cnames and mx!)

Unclear

[mcrbids]

Are you looking for features in a registrar or dns provider? While most registrars also provide DNS service, there's never a requirement that you have to use them. And use them I don't.

I got good and comfortable with Bind many years ago, and have the DNS administration stuff down pat. I have some really nice administration scripts that manage changes by service. Throw in a few variables, some regex, and some DNS boilerplate definition files, and I get the ability to re-ip a service (EG: websites, email, https, dbserver, etc. ad nauseum) for hundreds of domains in 60 seconds flat if you include updating the actual DNS servers with the changes. (I publish 2, I maintain 5 so that I can quickly switch nameservers in case of hardware/network failure)

Other than that, I have all my domains linked to two DNS servers by name, and occasionally I have to move a DNS server. It takes a few minutes.

Is this what you are looking for?

Re:Unclear

[maxume]

How come people that advertise technocrat.net on slashdot are always huge dicks about it?

Just wondering.

Re:Unclear

[Anonymous Coward]

What, a dweeb boasting about how leet his DNS setup is? No scripts or hints or anything? Yeah, I'm sure that's exactly what the OP was looking for. Really helpful dude.

Re:Unclear

[poopdeville]

They're self-selecting, since they're insecure and a web site validates their self-image.

Re:Unclear

[mcrbids]

Are you asking for them?

Seriously... this would be the first time I ever thought about it, since it's just a few PHP hacks, a definitions file, and a publish script with SSH... makes quick work of a tedious problem, but I never thought of it as a product, per se, and you'd have to understand Bind pretty well to make it work, anyway.

All of which is why I wrote "I got good and comfortable with Bind many years ago"...

Re:Global Traffic Manager

[Anonymous Coward]

Own your own distributed DNS infrastructure that comes with its own openAPI.

http://www.f5.com/products/big-ip/product-modules/global-traffic-manager.html

I'd like to own my own signed affidavit in which you disclose each and every real or potential financial tie that you have to F5.

To put that another way, you're coming across like a garden-variety spammer. Of course on Slashdot spammers know that an obvious spam won't go over so well, so they tend to use "product placement" techniques like what you just did. "Hey, I see you're talking about DNS with API access! Look, I just happened to point out that this commercial entity just happens to have one of those! Own your own!"

Re:Global Traffic Manager

[omniplex]

The API only really works if you want to manage the Wide IPs. iControl doesn't really have anything for working with the regular bind files. Plus it's a bit pricey for what it does and there are cheaper solutions that can be built rather then using a GTM.

Re:Most people I have ever met or seen

[ScrewMaster]

You sound like you've had a long drive home. How about posting in the relevant forum next time, m'kay?

I dunno ... it was a pretty damn good rant.

Network Engineer

[Anonymous Coward]

...or do it yourself. Easy, you're the boss, and you only pay for the hardware and net service. I would never buy DNS from anyone.

Re:you fa1l 1t

[Anonymous Coward]

Copy a 17 Meg file Every day...Like mire of decay, of various BSD Slashdot 'BSD is share, this news documents like a w1ll recall that it beyond the scope of

...he said as he collapsed on the keyboard, drooling, starting to realize that perhaps he was too drunk to post after all.

ZoneEdit

[bziman]

I've been using ZoneEdit for years and they're great. Free for small domains, and really cheap for huge domains. It never, ever breaks. And it's super easy to work with.

Re:ZoneEdit

[Anonymous Coward]

I second this, Zone edit is great; especially the free->paid conversion, they work on a "credits" system where you get 5 credits for free, and can buy more if you want; each dns domain is 1 credit; thus there is absolutely no difference between the free and paid service. There are a variety of tools that can talk to there servers (presumably via a published api) I have been using them since 2002 with no problems. Both for DNS and backup MX service.

EasyDNS

[seifried]

I like them, cheap and reliable, plus there's a CPAN module to interact with them. Personally I would also investigate running your own DNS servers, with Bind a simple run of sed through the text config files and a restart and you're done.

Re:EasyDNS

[PAjamian]

with Bind a simple run of sed through the text config files and a restart and you're done.

Not quite. You would still need to update serial numbers which is very important. I can't think of a simple line of sed that would both update the config itself and the serial numbers in all relevant files.

Re:EasyDNS

[seifried]

Uhh sed can do that you know. hint: -f

Re:EasyDNS

[a9db0]

I'll second this recommendation. Good folks, good support, reliable.

I concur

[LibertineR]

I've been using ZoneEdit for the past 4 years, and I dont remember a single problem with them. It is easy, as you said, and so cheap I feel guilty every time I use them.

Re:I concur

[Albanach]

They did in face have an outage in December 2006. It knocked many folk off the web - even folk who had paid for three servers.

I use them as a primary and secondary service, but also have 3rd and 4th nameservers elsewhere, also geographically dispersed. It'd take something pretty special to knock them all off line.

Since no one mentioned them...

[SanityInAnarchy]

dnsmadeeasy.

I only know about them because RightScale is using them.

Of course, when presented with this problem, I took an entirely different approach -- I wrote a DNS-as-REST server in Rails, and then a simple pipeclient-to-REST client/plugin for PowerDNS. The assumption is, it doesn't really have to perform well -- so long as it supports AXFR, you can set up any DNS server (or just about any provider) as a slave.

Re:Since no one mentioned them...

[Camel Pilot]

DNSMADEEASY works for me. Reasonable price and excellent service.

Re:Since no one mentioned them...

[WuphonsReach]

We've used DNSMadeEasy for quite a few years as well and I find them to be very good service.

They also support TXT records, which is something that a lot of DNS providers don't do (or don't do well). So we were able to publish SPF records for our domains without much trouble.

PowerDNS

[skelly33]

PowerDNS -> run it yourself with the convenience of doing mass updates in SQL statements instead of maintaining a few dozen zone files on disk. If you think 50 domains is hard, try running several thousand on a shared hosting cluster. You either need scripted automation, or some type of DB-managed solution like PowerDNS. It's by no means the only one like it, but in my experience has worked reasonably well.

Run your own hidden master

[Anonymous Coward]

Pay a nominal fee to have an ISP slave their big bad never-down DNS servers against your hidden master. Make sure it is set up to allow DDNS updates from your master so there is no lag making the new data public. All you have to worry about is TTL.

Your server server will not take the load and will not have the uptime requirement as the public servers. You can put just about any DNS software on your server so you can use any API you want there.

Re:Run your own hidden master

[Anonymous Coward]

Make sure it is set up to allow DDNS updates from your master

WTF? Ever heard of notify and zone transfers?

Re:Run your own hidden master

[Anonymous Coward]

We make the provision of such services mandatory when we get bids for the pipeline. There is no real extra cost as the competition for the actual bandwidth essentially requires them to throw it in for free if they want the business.

UltraDNS for me

[ShConfig]

Everyone has their opinions and I like UltraDns...great infrastructure, rock solid netwrok and API's

Re:UltraDNS for me

[tohmeiphun]

I agree, take a good look at UltraDNS

Re:UltraDNS for me

[gonk]

UltraDNS is Ultra Expensive when compared to similar offerings from Dynect and DNS Made Easy. They MAY have an edge in terms of infrastructure, but I don't believe its worth the extra cost for most folks. That's just my opinion, of course, which I came to during my recent evaluation of the three vendors.

robert

Dear Mr. Rho,

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi there, I am representing my client, Staples, Inc. Your use of the phrase "That was easy" treads upon the Intellectual Property right of Staples, Inc. Use of my client's slogan without prior written authorization is not permitted. You will immediately cease claiming that anything other than Staples, Inc. "was easy". This includes everything from DynDNS to your girlfriend and/or wife.

Sincerely yours,

Mr. Vatwozeezee

Re:Dear Mr. Rho,

[teroz]

drop dead Vatwozeezee who cares about your crammy company

Re:Dear Mr. Rho,

[arunn]

That was NOT SO easy.. i cudnt resist from laughing

Funny you mention it

[moniker127]

We're having similar problems with our dns here at ATT. Half of texas is in the friggin dark right now because of it too.

Run your own servers.

[ScytheBlade1]

1) Install and DNS server that supports what is technically called 'dynamic updates' and make sure that the updates can be authorized by keys. This server will be internal.

2) man nsupdate
Here, I'll even do this step for you: http://linux.die.net/man/8/nsupdate

3) Set the public facing DNS servers to transfer the zones from your internal DNS server.

4) Tada.

Using ISC BIND, I've setup my zones in a similar fashion. I configured the zone update authorization to be key based instead of IP based.

nsupdate uses no special magic, just RFC based standards to allow zone updates. If nsupdate doesn't fit your bill (and it should, it allows you to batch updates and send them), you can roll your own.

Keep in mind that 'dynamic update' doesn't mean 'low TTL value.' You can set it to whatever you please, it just means that you can updates records without any special zone magic.

www.editdns.net

[mhx]

www.editdns.net

UltraDNS

[pixel.jonah]

Great infrastructure, robust, API, good people. I've been using them for around nine years now - http://ultradns.com/ - highly recommended.

Re:UltraDNS

[MikeFM]

I recently switched to UltraDNS for my important domains after a string of problems related to my old providers going down under DDoS attacks. So far it seems good. A little pricey but that doesn't really matter so long as they deliver everything they promise.

Their support has already proven to be good too - they even answered a question that was more about my registar than DNS serving.

Run TinyDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Use TinyDNS with VegaDNS. kthx.

Maybe stick with EasyDNS

[POTSandPANS]

If EasyDNS seems like it will work well for you, Why not use them? Maybe you can make an annual donation and get them to work with you to come up with a perfect solution.

Otherwise, you could always set up your own master server. It's not really too hard to do, especially if you already have some experience with running web servers.

Linode

[blackbuddha]

http://www.linode.com/api/ Perl, Python, PHP bindings that let you manipulate your DNS entries, $20 a month will buy you a linode that runs the DNS server, decent security setup lets you distribute control without giving out your master passwords (and revoke access as necessary). I use them for my DNS management for a number of domains and I must say no one else I've seen has a superior DNS entry interface.

Re:Linode

[Roadmaster]

I second that, i've been a Linode customer for years and their service is great. I haven't used the DNS api but you might want to look into it; as long as it does what you want, I highly recommend the company itself.

What the heck?

[davidu]

I commented on this story in the firehose... what happened to that? [ http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=974977&cid=25145093 ]

I wrote:

We're working on providing a FULL API to EveryDNS. Slowly, but surely. I've got new folks on board taking over the site to make it finally be the awesome beast it should be. And it'll still be free. I'm also trying to figure out a way to tie this into Pingdom's API since a lot of people already use that for monitoring. :-)

-davidu

Re:What the heck?

[stefanlasiewski]

Comments made to articles in the firehose do not make it to the live site. It's like a BRAND NEW firehose.

Re:What the heck?

[hmart]

Great news!, EveryDNS is the best free DNS service, better than some commercial services. They also run opendns.org. Thanks David!

Re:What the heck?

[netaustin]

davidu,

I actually met you in college at one point; you were a senior, I was a [self involved] freshman, and you gave me some very good advice then too. FWIW.

Thanks to everyone for all the great advice. I'm going to probably roll with EveryDNS one way or the other out of loyalty to their service which has never let me down.

And we'll donate our savings from DNSPark.

We use and love OpenDNS too. If you're ever in New York, I owe you a beer.

-netaustin

Re:What the heck?

[davidu]

Well that obviously makes a lot of sense. :-)

Thanks for letting me know.

-davidu

Re:What the heck?

[kv9]

your UID is awesomer than his.

Try openDNS

[BhaKi]

www.opendns.com

Re:Try openDNS

[The Real Tachyon]

Yes, we run our own DNS with OpenDNS as our forwarders. It's a great service so far and we're very happy with it. However, I'm not entirely sure that they provide what the OP was looking for, but I could be wrong.

Slicehost

[kchrist]

Slicehost, the preferred Linux VPS host of web 2.0 developers everywhere, has an published API that you can use to access their DNS hosting and make whatever changes you need.

Re:Slicehost

[SanityInAnarchy]

I'll second Slicehost. Never used their DNS, but with how right they've gotten everything else, I suspect the DNS will rock.

How about running myDNS?

[elitocracy]

How about running myDNS (http://mydns.bboy.net/ )? It has a DB backend so changing 50 entries is a breeze and instant as well.

You're kidding, right?

[The Cisco Kid]

If you are managing that many domains, perhaps its time you, oh, I dunno, ran your *OWN* DNS server?

Re:You're kidding, right?

[MikeFM]

See how well your DNS stays up under a massive DDoS attack when you're running your own little server on a T1 line. I've learned from experience that it sucks.

Re:You're kidding, right?

[ledow]

And the DDoS won't stop the entire service being inaccessible from the outside anyway? DNS is the least of your issues because of DNS caching across the globe. If you're being DDoS'd then you're in trouble anyway... that's not a reason to not run your own DNS or, indeed, to choose an external one. If your DNS host gets DDoS'd, people will still find your IP and get to your services. But if YOU get DDoS'd, there's no service to get to anyway, so it doesn't matter where the DNS is.

Reliability, reduced support costs, etc. could easily make you choose a third-party over your own DNS but DDoS... that's just picking at straws.

Personally, I'd roll my own because:

1) It will mean more control
2) When something does go wrong YOU can fix it without having to wait.
3) It provide more incentive to keep the in-house IT teams going.
4) You're not reliant on a third-party not to go bust, change their API, get DDoS'd, etc.
5) You can extend it whenever you like, just by slapping in a server someone else in the world and running the same software/config on it.

Re:You're kidding, right?

[The Cisco Kid]

Who said anything about a 'little server on a T1'? I would suggest colo a box at one of any number of facilities that provide that service, that certainly have more than a DS1.

And even if he was using a 'little server on a T1', running your own server doesnt mean you can't arrange for slave service from any number of providers around the net, who certainly have more than a DS1.

Re:You're kidding, right?

[aevans]

3) It provide more incentive to keep the in-house IT teams going. If someone can use a web interface or Ruby API to do your full time job in a few minutes, it's probably time you learn new skills. It sucked for manufacturing too, but when a million dollar Japanese robot can do your job better (and cheaper), I'm buying the robot. When a practically free web service can do your job better and cheaper, same thing.

Nominum ANS

[chrome]

I know your post was asking more about hosted DNS solutions, but if you have a budget to do it right, take a look at Nominum ANS. Has a great SOAP API and supports zone templates.

use infoblox

[Anonymous Coward]

Infoblox provides a DNS appliance with a full perl api. www.infoblox.com

Zerigo

[zarqman]

Try Zerigo:NS (http://ns.zerigo.com/). The template feature may be enough to meet your needs. Change one template and every domain dependent on it changes at once.

If the templates aren't enough, there's also a REST API (brand new, not yet announced on the site, but should be functional).

Shoot me an email after setting up an account and I'll comp you at least 6mo of whatever level account you need to fit your domains. Be sure to let me know what level account you need.

To the rest of /. -- I'll comp any of you too: just mention this thread and let me know what account level.

(Disclaimer: If it wasn't obvious, I am affiliated with Zerigo.)

TinyDNS w/ VegaDNS

[Anonymous Coward]

ftw.

Re:Global Traffic Manager

[SL Baur]

Look, I just happened to point out that this commercial entity just happens to have one of those! Own your own!"

Hey! It works for the Microsoft Windows guys.

GoDaddy dba WildWest

[bobbozzo]

GoDaddy dba WildWest has an API, but we seem to have ended up being guinea pigs for it, and it didn't go well. Their documentation had features that didn't exist, promised 24-hour turnaround on support failed, ...
It's working OK now, but I can't really recommend it.

please get off a 3rd party service.

[Anonymous Coward]

nictool.

CNAME?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds to me like you're routing all requests through one IP/server/cluster.

If that's the case, and the thing that chances is the IP, why not do this differently?

Why not use a CNAME from the webhosts to a service name, change the IP of the service name, and all the others change?

If you're somehosting.com, and you need to change ny.somehosting.com etc, just CNAME ny.somehosting.com to www.somehosting.com, then change ww.somehosting.com whenever you need?

Domeneshop.

[knubo]

Hi.

I like domeneshop. (http://www.domainnameshop.com/)

They sell domain names and offers free dns services for registered customers.

They're located in Oslo, Norway and do all their hosting from there.

Tooting my own horn...

[dtdns]

I'll throw DtDNS into the mix, which is the service I have operated for the last ten years. There is no public API aside from the IP update for dyamic hosts/domains, but we have built specific APIs for clients in the past. A "search and replace" function for zones will be available on the web site in the near future as well for mass IP changes.

Re:Global Traffic Manager

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Maybe your right, but if you've ever been in a serious datacenter, you'd know f5 is everywhere. Used by the big guys. Considering the asker doesn't seem to have a clue, I don't think thats the route for him.

Run your own ...

[Skapare]

... DNS servers, using the reliable, secure, high performing, authoritative-only, name server software called NSD. Generate your zone files from a script in your favorite language, and be done with the issues.

Re:Most people I have ever met or seen

[Anonymous Coward]

If I am in the left lane and no one else is on the road,

... then you're the asshole for driving in the wrong lane, asshole

Try Neustar (formerly UltraDNS) they have an api

[Anonymous Coward]

We've been using the neustar system for about 4 years now, find them to be quite reliable. They have provided well for our needs which are somewhat simlar to yours. They can be found at neustar.biz. Don't be fooled be the goofy domain these guys are enterprise solution providers and they host dns for such applications as hotmail. They have a long track record of being a leader in this area.

They do offer an api, as well as a bulk importer.
Matthew Carson
NetroMedia.com

DNS Made Easy

[Bud-froggy]

I highly recommend DNS made easy: https://www.dnsmadeeasy.com/s0306/res/ddnsc.html I use them with a bunch of serves on EC2 and it works like a charm.

Re:Try Neustar (formerly UltraDNS) they have an ap

[Skapare]

Does the programming that calls the API actually run on their server?

Re:Fix Our Economy

[CmdrGravy]

Watch out for his Jew Claw though, they can be dangerous so it's best to approach them in mobs.

Enom provides API access to their services

[SirPrize]

I've been hosting my domains with Enom since over 10 years now, and am very happy with the level of service they provide. Their control panels let you do most anything you need including setting TXT records, and there's an API they provide so you can programmatically make changes too. Very slick.

Gandi.net

[dam.capsule.org]

I recommend again Gandi. They have very good service, very good ethics (completely adds free) and an XML API for managing your account if you choose the reseller account (which you would want anyway with 50+ domains). They ask 12EUR/year for a .com domain. I already recommended them yesterday for their email offer which is free with your domains.

I'm pretty sure...

[Anonymous Coward]

That whatever you choose, DJB would not agree with you.

EditDNS.net

[neon47]

I've recently switched my domains to editdns.net. The main reason for this was that ZoneEdit didnt't support SRV records. EditDNS does indeed have a simple API which just requires passing parameters to a PHP along with a predefined API key.

ishidden.net

[Anonymous Coward]

ishidden.net is also a great place to get a dynamic ip. You do not have to keep clicking on email links and there is an open API to write your own clients.

ultradns

[Anonymous Coward]

ultradns that is the best and fastest provider.

"...they both feel a bit Microsoft-y..."

[gatkinso]

What, precisely, is that supposed to mean?

Oh, the ol' slip in a M$ jibe to get posted on Slashdot? I thought so.

Re:"...they both feel a bit Microsoft-y..."

[Blakey Rat]

I was wondering the same thing. Could somebody please define the term "Microsoft-y?"

DNSMadeEasy

[Anonymous Coward]

DNSMadeEasy (http://www.dnsmadeeasy.com) is a good provider. Serious people, reasonable prices, remarkable service. I've been using this service for years without a problem.

Try GoDaddy

[nberardi]

I am surprised nobody I have seen mentions GoDaddy. They don't have a API that I know of, but they have a copy feature that allows you to copy setting(s) from one domain to all the domains. Makes mass updates very easy, and their DNS is rock solid and fast. Plus they are free if you have a GoDaddy account.

Re:Try GoDaddy

[sega01]

Go Daddy will take down your domain if they hear a peep about it, and cause all sorts of trouble. http://nodaddy.com/ I'd just run NSD and serve them from in-house (maybe get an external VPS as a slave).

specifically

[dilvish_the_damned]

dyndns.org and your done.

Uh, just run your own DNS server?

[Giant Electronic Bra]

It isn't all that hard you know...

And even a pretty busy DNS server doesn't require vast hardware resources. You already obviously have a hosting infrastructure, etc. Bind 9 can serve up a LARGE amount of DNS requests on a couple of fairly low end machines.

Re:Uh, just run your own DNS server?

[billcopc]

A bunch of uncoordinated EC2 nodes hardly counts as a "hosting infrastructure".

EC2 nodes are just that: nodes. They're handy if you want to scale the cluster on-demand, but for a lot of the things people use them, they are more trouble that they're worth.

I'm quite glad Amazon doesn't offer fixed IPs on EC2, as that would encourage even more of these nonsensical setups.

UltraDns

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably the most technically advanced DNS provider in the industry is UltraDns (http://www.ultradns.com/). Full (working) api that does both hosted dns, and slaves. I don't imagine you'll find a more responsive tech support line.

But EasyDNS does have an API!

[IMarvinTPA]

EasyDNS does have an API for "Dynamic" IP addresses.

Their clients are listed here: http://support.easydns.com/dyndns.php

And the API is here:
http://support.easydns.com/tutorials/dynamicUpdateSpecs.php
IMarv.

If you want it done right, do it yourself.

[mnslinky]

Why do so many people refuse to run DNS themselves? At the very least, you can find a provider to host the public DNS, but you can host the primary DNS, which we propagate out to the public servers. This way, you can do whatever you like. BIND uses a flat text file for it's configuration. Easy to parse, edit, etc, with a script.

Do some friggin' homework before you post such a stupid question.

man sed(1)

[fizzyflux]

man sed(1)

Re:Global Traffic Manager

[mother_reincarnated]

Disclaimer: Not only do I work for F5 but I'm in SALES

There isn't much iControl integration into the BIND running on the GTM, but for this scenario all these names would be WIPs- so using iControl to move traffic around would work perfectly.

And F5 is never going to be the cheapest but it is usually the best (and when it comes to LTM and GTM, I've got no qualms saying that). For this particular guys needs it is overkill- he doesn't care about HA or site redundancy, he just wants API access to DNS. He also isn't using LTM so he gets no benefit from the integration between the two [And I'm pretty positive Amazon isn't going to give him credentials on their EC2 F5's :)].

This is some front line admin that just wants to make his life easier- not a business looking to avoid outages on mission critical apps [read that:cost significant revenue when they're down]- so I personally wouldn't push too hard to sell the guy an enterprise/carrier grade $50k+ global load balancing solution.

Exactly!

[namalc]

So when I read this story, I read it because I'm looking to learn something from the comments. I think thats the direction the slashdot community is going towards.

Exactly! I agree 100% with the prior poster.

As for the grandparent post, where is the sense of community? The OP obviously does not know how to do this in-house by himself, so he turned to the community. Is that a bad thing? It's the old "apprenticeship" model except he was looking to learn from his online peers.

Someone please kill the Ask Slashdot category

[billcopc]

Let's look at the facts:

- You have 50 domains.
- You're running a multi-layered cluster of web servers on EC2 (why?!)
- You're (ab)using a free DNS service

How hard could it possibly be for you to set up ONE conventional dedicated server as the front-end ? You could run your own DNS on there along with Pound/Varnish or whatever perverse setup you think you need. More importantly you shouldn't be using DNS as your node list... just write your own simple scripts to keep track of all your nodes, then you won't have to fight with DNS refresh issues at all, you can update your proxies instantly.

All these Amazon pay-as-you-go services are fascinating, but most people don't have a clue how to use them properly.

Re:Someone please kill the Ask Slashdot category

[netaustin]

No, we're not abusing a free DNS service; *I personally* use EveryDNS for my own simple personal sites. And if we switch to it, we'll pay for it.

Of course we're not using DNS as a node list, and we're not using Dynamic DNS; we use Amazon EIP and keep records of servers (with a script, by using instance groups) independent of DNS.

And how is using Pound and Varnish perverse? We're stuck with an extraordinarily memory intensive application that mostly just serves static content, so we need a page cache, and one caching server won't suffice when we make it to the front page of Digg or on the Drudge Report, so we need a load balancer for multiple page caches. I *know* I need this setup; if there's a better way to serve millions of page views a month off a slow-loading, memory-eating, crash-prone application... please, let me know. I'd love to be able to rewrite the application, but we don't have time for that until mid next year.

And as for using EC2 in the first place, we kind of have to because we need the best computing value per dollar with no contracts and just-in-time expansion--these are all business decisions, not technical decisions. That said, in more than a year of running EC2 heavily, I've never been disappointed.

Fact is, Amazon has built in many very nice considerations for conventional web sites, and there are many sites that use it in this way. The flexibility and value we get out of EC2 greatly outweigh the risk.

I think you might be right about the master DNS server though; we have a couple of utility (continuous build, SVN, Trac, miscellany) servers that could do the trick nicely.

Re:Someone please kill the Ask Slashdot category

[billcopc]

I'm obviously coming from the dedicated-server camp, and while I know nothing about your application, I am still inclined to think a handful of beefy servers could handle your traffic, for less money, and with less complexity. Hardware has gotten so cheap, any caffeinated twit can build an 8-way Xeon rig under $2k, then all you need is a big fat pipe.

I remember running the numbers for EC2 a while back, and I was quite puzzled as to who would want such an expensive and limited service, when hosting providers are chopping prices all over the place in fierce competition. You can't google "cheap web servers" without tripping over a pallet of $29 single-core deals, and a preconfigured quad can be found under $200. A freakin' quad! That can push out over 9000 splogs :)

Re:Someone please kill the Ask Slashdot category

[netaustin]

What's missing from that model is burstability; we run on just one Apache and Varnish server (versus four) at night. So I'm inclined to think that our solution is cheaper. Actually, what attracted us to EC2 was that it allows us to run without a contract.

We run about a dozen leased servers that are all at least dual core with 8 gigs. Honestly, that cluster just runs itself; we never have to intervene like with do with EC2. So I'm inclined to agree with you--all other things being equal, I'd rather have a gaggle of powerful physical servers.

But not all technical decisions are made for purely technical reasons. But that's another thread.

Depends on the kind of API you want

[just-a-stone]

DNS already provides a great API using the Master-Slave mechanism.

In detail:
Set up a nameserver of your choice. This might by pdns with ldap backend or anything with mysql backend. Do not waste a thought about performance, it won't have a lot of traffic.

Then search for some good slave nameserver providers. They are often called "secondary", but this should not be mixed up.

In theory:
Master: Authoritative namesevrer (your private one)
Slave: Nameserver that refresh based on your SOA record

In contrast to:
primary: Your first nameserver (should be mentioned in the SOA record too)
secondary: Nameserver 2-..

A nice setup for easy management would be like that:

(hidden) Master -> [ (primary) Slave | (secondary) Slave ]

EveryDNS, XName.org, twisted4life,... provide "secondary" nameservers in the meaning of slaves.

Sign up at at least two of these and restrict your private nameserver / firewall rules to only allow your slaves.

That's it. Manage your zones locally with any script you want, the slaves will come to get it (or if they support notify, your master pushes it out). Your master doesn't get a single connect by the users, you don't have the traffic and availability of the master is not really that important (it has to serve ~4 clients, depending on your SOA refresh about 30 requests a day..). The NS records in your zone don't mention your private server, your registry doesn't have to know of it's existence either.

Drawback: Not all "secondary" (in the meaning of slave again) providers support all DNS record types. Some strip out TXT, some do not serve SRV even if your zone contains some.

Search the web for "hidden master DNS" for further information.

Nettica templates might work.

[the_mice]

I've been using Nettica to manage all of my DNS for a couple of years and am very pleased with them. Service has been fantastic and their features seem quite good. They have a template feature to administer many domains at once... might be what you're looking for.

What Do You Need From an API?

[nijyusan]

I wouldn't exactly call it an API, but DNS Made Easy offers dynamic DNS in a way that seems pretty flexible to me. I haven't used it, but I've been very happy with their service for my static DNS entries - the service is quite flexible, the updates are REALLY fast, and I haven't ever had any problems. It costs me $5 a month, and it sounds like your needs would come to about $7 per month. You do have to pay up front, but I've been happy with them since... hmm, February. It feels like longer (I guess moving twice will do that to you).

DNS Made Easy's dynamic DNS and pricing.

Disclaimer: I'm not affiliated in any with DNS Made Easy, just a satisfied customer. They do have an affiliate program but... I don't want to look like a whore on Slashdot! Sigh, social norms.

Yeah, well.

[Giant Electronic Bra]

The cost of setting up a couple DNS servers in a couple of different locations is going to be pretty trivial for anything but the very smallest shops. Basically depends on if it is worth the bother and minor expense.

Ultra DNS

[Anonymous Coward]

Ultra DNS offers a Full API as well to inject bulk changes, this is complimented by real time propagation. Unfortunately their pricing is not as low as DynDNS.

Domains Made Easy

[Anonymous Coward]

Domainsmadeasy has a feature called Domain Templates, best thing since sliced bread. Update the template, update a million domains in one go.

Also supports dynamic IPs within those domain templates if you so wish.

D.

Re:Exactly! (Yes, Exactly!)

[KindMind]

As for the grandparent post, where is the sense of community? The OP obviously does not know how to do this in-house by himself, so he turned to the community. Is that a bad thing? It's the old "apprenticeship" model except he was looking to learn from his online peers.

I agree. I'm not a network admin (I'm a dev), but I'm always looking to expand my understanding of network topics. I find questions (and especially the answers) interesting because I *am* trying to learn more.

Re:diy == doa

[maestroX]

That's what HE was hired for.

I'm glad we've reached an understanding here: Slashdot, News for Noobs.

Now, please turn in your account, Mr. WhatAmIDoingHere .. allow me to have at least a meaningful nickname.

(In return, I offer a Slashdot account with a preciously low UID stored on an Indy with dead CMOS)

As to my statement, Slashdot, News for Noobs, I present the following facts:

• I've been lurking around here for quite some years,
• My comments have never been modded over +3 insightful.
• Not my comments have never been modded over +3 insightful.
• I must be a noob.
• QED: Slashdot, News for Noobs.

Re:Exactly! (Yes, Exactly!)

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah sure, nobody doesn't want you to learn. But why does this stuff have to appear on a major tech news site when you could just as easily do a search on wikipedia, google or microsoft live (lol, just kidding :) and find all relevant introduction, howto's and tutorials. That will teach you a lot more in the long run.

zonedit

[sgt scrub]

I've become a fan of zonedit. Normally I roll my own but, well, I'm f-n-lazy.

Re:Exactly! (Yes, Exactly!)

[KindMind]

True. And I have done just that. It's more of a "tried and true" thing. Sometimes (many times) on any given topic, there's so much out there it's really hard to separate wheat from chaff. I'd rather hear from a community I trust (I know - what am I, crazy? Trust slashdotters?) that has some experience in the area of whatever topic.

Just a wild thought...

[mindstrm]

Crazy idea here - why not just run your own?

Re:diy == doa

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Wha... what?

Be aware...

[jeff.hogston]

My company did try UltraDNS (now called NeuStar) and our records were deleted twice. Also, the billing is ridiculous, our overages went from an average of $200 to $9,000 and they would provide no logs to support it (says Ray McKenzie "we will be happy to enable our logging feature now and maybe there it will give some clue as to where the queries are coming from"). Their stance, "pay us or we'll turn it over to collections". Stay away from Neustar (aka UltraDNS)