DNS & Bind 3e - Softcover

Albitz, Paul

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1565925122 ISBN 13: 9781565925120

Publisher: O′Reilly, 1998

Synopsis

DNS and BIND discusses one of the Internet's fundamental building blocks: the distributed host information database that's responsible for translating names into addresses, routing mail to its proper destination, and many other services. As the authors write in the preface, if you're using the Internet, you're already using DNS -- even if you don't know it.The third edition covers BIND 4.9, on which most commercial products are currently based, and BIND 8, which implements many important new features and will be the basis for the next generation of commercial name servers. It also covers topics like DNS security (greatly improved with BIND 8.1), asynchronous notification of changes to a zone, dynamic updates, and programming with Perl's Net::DNS module.Whether you're an administrator involved with DNS on daily basis, or a user who wants to be more informed about the Internet and how it works, you'll find that this book is essential reading.Topics include:

• What DNS does, how it works, and when you need to use it
• How to find your own place in the Internet's name space
• Setting up name servers
• Using MX records to route mail
• Configuring hosts to use DNS name servers
• Subdividing domains (parenting)
• Securing your name server: restricting who can query your server, preventing unauthorized zone transfers, avoiding bogus name servers, etc.
• Mapping one name to several servers for load sharing
• Troubleshooting: using nslookup, reading debugging output, common problems
• DNS programming, using the resolver library and Perl's Net::DNS module

About this title

Review:

This is the definitive book on the Domain Name System (DNS), the powerful scheme that facilitates the translation of English-like domain names (www.amazon.com) into computer-comprehensible Internet Protocol (IP) addresses (208.216.182.15). If you run a DNS server of any kind, particularly under Unix, you need to have this book on hand.

This book's early chapters give a view of DNS from high altitude, explaining basic concepts such as domains, name servers and name resolution. From there, the authors proceed on a more practical tack, presenting specific instructions for setting up your own domain and DNS server using BIND. The authors then tell you what to do as your domain grows and you need to add more machines, subdomains, and greater throughput capacity. They also talk a lot about nslookup and C programming with the various DNS and BIND libraries. Administrators will find the chapter on BIND debugging output particularly helpful. Here, the authors translate BIND's mysterious error messages and offer specific strategies for fixing and optimising the program. This edition covers BIND 8.1.2, but pays lots of attention to older versions that are still in wide use (4.8.3 and 4.9). The authors are careful to note differences among the versions. --David Wall, Amazon.com

About the Author:

Paul Albitz is a software engineer at Hewlett-Packard. Paul earned a bachelor of science degree from the University of Wisconsin, LaCrosse, and a master of science degree from Purdue University. Paul worked on BIND for the HP-UX 7.0 and 8.0 releases. During this time Paul developed the tools used to run the hp.com domain. Since then Paul has worked on networking HP's DesignJet plotter and on the fax subsystem of HP's OfficeJet multifunction peripheral. Before joining HP, Paul was a system administrator in the CS Department of Purdue University. As system administrator, Paul ran versions of BIND before BIND's initial release with 4.3 BSD. Paul and his wife Katherine live in San Diego, CA. Cricket Liu matriculated at the University of California's Berkeley campus, that great bastion of free speech, unencumbered UNIX and cheap pizza. He went to work for Hewlett-Packard after graduation and stayed at HP for nine years. Cricket began managing the hp.com zone after the Loma Prieta earthquake forcibly moved the zone's management from HP Labs to HP's Corporate Offices. He was hostmaster@hp.com for over three years, and then joined HP's Professional Services Organization to found HP's Internet consulting program. Cricket currently runs his own DNS consulting and training company, Acme Byte & Wire, with his friend Matt Larson. Cricket, his wife, Paige, and their son, Walt, live in Colorado with two Siberian Huskies, Annie and Dakota. On warm weekends, you'll probably find them on the flying trapeze.

About this edition

• Publisher: O′Reilly
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 1565925122
• ISBN 13: 9781565925120
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 3
• Number of pages: 456