Resolver strangeness in 8.2.2-REL

[Kenneth W Cochran]

Hi,

I'm running bind 8.2.2-REL in Slackware Linux 7 and am getting
"unknown host" messages if I try to access a host by name.
Access by IP-address works fine, as do "host" & "nslookup," both
in "forward" & "reverse" (by both name & ip-address).

Configuration is cache-only, & queries go out the "default"
route, which changes depending on who I dial-in (ppp) to.

I can "fix" this by putting a nameserver directive in
/etc/resolv.conf (0.0.0.0 & 127.0.0.1 both work), but the
O'Reilly (v3) book doesn't explain much here & the docs/faqs
seem to advise against this.

Unless I'm mistaken, I shouldn't even *need* a resolv.conf,
since this is supposed to be handled by the nameserver.  (??)
I've always done without this before...

Is there a Right Way to do this?  Doc/faq pointers welcome.

Many thanks,

-kc