rndc (and now nsupdate too)

[Kevin Darcy]

On 7/31/2014 3:08 PM, /dev/rob0 wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 31, 2014 at 05:56:08PM +0200, Reindl Harald wrote:
>> Am 31.07.2014 um 17:41 schrieb /dev/rob0:
>>> On Thu, Jul 31, 2014 at 01:32:03PM +0200, Reindl Harald wrote:
>>>> i am doing reloads of named with "killall -HUP named" just
>>>> because i disabled rndc completly for security reasons and
>>>> configurations are generated with own software only needs
>>>> named to reload
>>> Hmm, rndc is securable. You don't have to open it to the
> snip
>>> You're losing a lot of new features without rndc. This is a
>>> "throwing out the baby with the bathwater" sort of solution.
>>> Sure, this is what you are familiar with and what works for
>>> you, but to disable rndc isn't good advice for readers of
>>> this list.  ISC is moving on
>> don't get me wrong but if someone creates *any* bind
>> configuration and zone-files with self developed software
> ... that someone is almost surely doing it wrong.  "Zone files"?
>
>> there are no features rndc could provide and so disable
>> something you don't use is the way to go instead make is
>> secure with other switches
> The proper tool to manage named configuration and operation, and
> which in the best Unix ethic is well suited for automation, is
> rndc(8).
>
> The proper tool to manage zone data is nsupdate(8).  Likewise well
> suited for automation.
>
> Unfortunately, it seems that no one with an adequate understanding of
> BIND has written and released a good management frontend.  Too many
> of them are still wallowing around in zone file editing rather than
> nsupdate and (as it seems from this thread) sending of signals rather
> than rndc.
Written? Yes. Released? Unfortunately not. It's intellectual property of 
my employer.

Even with the nice GUI frontend of Infoblox, we still use our homegrown, 
crudely-formatted web frontend for the vast majority of changes 
(Infoblox being the backend of that frontend), since
a) our existing users are accustomed to it,
b) it's simple enough that even novices can get up to speed on it 
quickly, without the possibility of causing major disruption,
c) the lack of significant eye-candy means it still runs well even in 
slow and/or high-latency locations,
d) it has a more robust ACL system that I haven't seen rivaled in any 
commercial product, and
e) other stuff I've added over the years, like automatic 
external-to-internal sync'ing, and so forth

- Kevin