Dynamic DNS

[Barry Margolin]

In article <pktN3.1911$y45.54234 at news4.giganews.com>,
Super Pete <SuperPete at earthling.net> wrote:
>I am trying to get Dynamic DNS set up for my domain. The challenge that I
>face is that I'm extremely cheap, and I am a control freak.
>
>I WILL be hosting my domain on my own hardware, I will not be paying any
>outrageous amounts of money for a static IP.
>
>What I have done to this point is set up dynamic DNS through dyndns.org.
>Now I am trying to get my domain to point to my dyndns.org hostname.  I have
>tried to do this through Granite Canyon, but they don't seem to like that I
>am substituting my dyndns.org hostname for a static IP.

A records require IP addresses -- that's part of the specification of the
DNS protocol.  If you want to make one name translate to another name, you
must use CNAME records.

>The entry I have submitted to Granite Canyon (note that the names have been
>changed to protect the somewhat innocent):
>
>; Name Servers
>
>mydomain.com.  IN  NS ns1.granitecanyon.com.
>mydomain.com.  IN  NS ns2.granitecanyon.com.
>
>
>localhost.mydomain.com.   IN  A  127.0.0.1
>
>www.mydomain.com.  IN  A  mydomain.dyndns.org

This should be a CNAME record.

>; some useful puns that cannot be CNAMEs because
>; they are referenced by MX records, below
>
>mail.mydomain.com. IN A mydomain.dyndns.org.

Either this should be a CNAME record and you should remove the
mail.mydomain.com MX record below, or you should remove this record and
leave the MX record.

>; an address for the zone itself

You won't be able to make the zone name point to your machine, because the
zone name cannot be a CNAME record.

>www.mydomain.com. IN A mydomain.dyndns.org.

This is a duplicate of the above entry, and again must be a CNAME record.

>; MX records
>
>; These direct mail delivery agents, like sendmail,
>; at hosts which have agreed to accept email for us.
>
>; This assumes that we've arranged with tea.com and
>; uu.net to provide this email service for us in
>; advance for coffee.com.
>
>; The token 'EXTREF' directs nslint to allow external references.
>; The token 'GLOBALOK' directs nslint to allow global records.
>
>; MX records for a host to be treated specially
>mail.mydomain.com. IN MX 10 mydomain.dyndns.org.

You need the '; EXTREF' comment on this line.

>; MX records for email addressed to the zone itself
>mydomain.com. IN MX 10 mydomain.dyndns.org.

You need the '; EXTREF' comment on this line.

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar at bbnplanet.com
GTE Internetworking, Powered by BBN, Burlington, MA
*** DON'T SEND TECHNICAL QUESTIONS DIRECTLY TO ME, post them to newsgroups.
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