wierd bind problem.... queries not answered...

[Mark.Andrews at nominum.com]

> 
> 
> I'm having a really wierd problem...  When my Debian 2.2 box running bind
> 8.2.2 p7 is rebooted, named restarts and sends out priming queries, and
> never gets any answer.  So I would type something like:
> 
> nslookup debian.org
> 
> and I would get:
> 
> Server:  localhost
> Address:  127.0.0.1
> 
> *** localhost can't find debian.org: No response from server
> 
> Now, I'm monitoring all this with
> 
> tcpdump -nx -s 128 ip and port 53
> 
> And I can see the requests go out, but nothing ever comes back in, from
> either the forward servers or the fail-over root servers.  I can ping
> these servers successfully while this is going on.
> 
> Now THIS is where it gets strange.  If I restart bind with
> 
> /etc/init.d/bind stop
> /etc/init.d/bind start
> 
> (and no other changes)
> 
> SOMETIMES it will start working again and everything looks as it should,
> including the tcpdump output.  On the second restart it usually works.  
> We only have a packet firewall, not a stateful one, so that's not the
> issue...
> 
> (we are making the request on a non-priveldged port)
> 
> The only thing I can think of is sending mal-formed queries out, but even
> those should get some kind of response.  The other possibility is that
> this is a hardware problem, as this first appeared after a power outage
> during a lightning storm, but two identical machines (va linux 2 by
> 2s) are doing the exact same thing.  I also tried switching from my
> home-compiled verions to the offical Debian binaries.
> 
> Any ideas?  Need more information?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> -Jeff

	Think about it.

	If the packets are leaving the server what is stopping them
	reaching the root server or stopping the answers getting
	back.

	Do you have a fire wall?
	Are you too many hops from the root servers?
	Do you have the correct addresses in the hints?
	Do you have the correct addresses for the forwarders?

	Mark

--
Mark Andrews, Nominum Inc.
1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia
PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742                 INTERNET: Mark.Andrews at nominum.com