Where to find detailed info on nsupdate

[Simon Waters]

Sean Kowal wrote:
> 
> Does anyone know where I can find (on the web) detailed info on how to
> use nsupdate along with all of its commands? The man pages are
> inadequate and every site i've visited seems to give just a few
> examples on how to use it with no listing of commands. I would like to
> be able to update things like the SOA RR in ddns zone, etc... Thanx in
> advance.

No. 

Books - DNS & BIND Cricket and Lui is the best I've seen, whilst
Langfeldt is good on explaining what the bigger picture is.

You can't delete the SOA, so you just add it and the old one
goes by magic. You have to update the serial number, which may
make the behaviour non deterministic, as the serial # could
change whilst you prepare the command if more dynamic updates
were received, so you need to add a bigger increment than 1, but
less than 2^31, usual rules.

Making sure your SOA change is meaningful is slightly harder - I
guess you can change the e-mail address, and various timing
settings. Whilst you have to update the serial #, you don't
actually care much about serial # in the dynamic DNS world, as
it will increase as needed automatically.

dig +short eighth-layer.internal soa
linux1.eighth-layer.internal. root.linux1.eighth-layer.internal.
2001121611 1080
0 3600 604800 300

nsupdate -k dnskey/Ktest.+157+00995.key
> update add eighth-layer.internal. 86400 SOA linux1.eighth-layer.internal. root.com. 2001121612 10900 3500 650000 301
>

dig +short eighth-layer.internal soa
linux1.eighth-layer.internal. root.com. 2001121612 10900 3500
650000 301 

I think I'm getting the hang of the DDNS, but I still don't like
it ;)

All the above is BIND 9.2 - you'd be daft to be trying this with
anything else.