syslog errors on new server (Fwd)

[Kevin Darcy]

Jim Reid wrote:

> >>>>> "Mark" == Mark E Drummond <drummond-m at rmc.ca> writes:
>
>     Mark> Rick Reineman wrote:
>     >>  I just got DNS running for the first time on a Solaris 2.7
>     >> system.  I believe it is using BIND 8.1.2.  It is a
>     >> non-internet server, the primary server is the root.
>
>     Mark> Maybe I am wrong here but I seem to remember reading in the
>     Mark> Linux DNS-HOWTO that for a closed net you do not need a root
>     Mark> zone at all. I help manage a closed net for another company
>     Mark> and set their DNS up w/o a root zone. It works just fine.
>
> It may appear to work "just fine", but it's not. The name server will
> be squealing that it can't find any name servers for the root
> zone. Unless the server knows about ".", it cannot know the name space
> it operates in. [i.e. What domain names exist and which don't.] There
> are bound to be lots of messages about this in the name server's logs.

Not only that, but queries outside any domain that the nameserver knows
about will return SERVFAIL to the client instead of NXDOMAIN. The
difference may not matter to most applications, but it may matter to
some.


- Kevin