BIND problem

[Simon Waters]

Barry Margolin wrote:
> 
> >       No. BIND 9 does detect overflow and reports a range error.
> 
> Wow, that's going to screw lots of sites

> Do the BIND 9 installation instructions warn about this for people
> upgrading from BIND 8 or lower?  IMHO, incompatibilities like this should
> be in BIG BOLD LETTERS.

Not in big bold letters, and yes the warning says it is "near"
the next line.

Should be in the "migration" file with the warning about not
using "." in serial numbers I think.

I've just written instructions for fixing this at a clients
site.

"dig domainname. soa" will get the value to mod 2^32, and then
use Mark's little serial program to check the arithmetic, step
2^31-1 with BIND 8 if needed, then step the rest of the way with
BIND 9.

However I don't have that much sympathy for computer
administrators who when asked to give a 32 bit positive integer
get it wrong. Didn't they think it odd that "dig" gave a
different answer to what was in the zone file? A little bit of
practice at arithmetic will be good for them. YYYYMMDDNN is fine
for the foreseeable future.