Using dynamic DNS and TTL as a poor man's redundancy

[Barry Margolin]

In article <dhv591$1jr7$1 at sf1.isc.org>,
 Kevin Darcy <kcd at daimlerchrysler.com> wrote:

> Having said all of that, though, many folks use DNS-based GSLB and it 
> works fairly well for them/us. The thing that gets me, though, is the 
> moral aspect of DNS-based GSLB, i.e. low TTLs don't just waste the 
> resources of the authoritative servers for the relevant zone (and 
> associated network bandwidth, etc.), they also waste the resources of 
> every resolver trying to resolve the name(s) in question. It's like a 
> drunk driver on the road, not just endangering himself/herself, but also 
> everyone in the immediate vicinity. It's like a moocher of other 
> people's resolver capacity; what I think economists call "externalizing 
> costs".

I think most network operators simply consider this a necessary evil, 
"that's the way the Internet works", so caching servers are expected to 
have the capacity to handle all the extra queries that result.  It's 
become a de facto standard, so it's considered morally OK.

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar at alum.mit.edu
Arlington, MA
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