blanks in owner and host names

[Bob Vance]

Linux RH 6.1 with kernel update to 2.2.16
dhcp server 3.0b2pl11
BIND 8.2.3T9B

I have dynamic DNS updates working fine (except for one tiny problem
with dhcpd that I'm researching, and which problem is really irrelevant
to this posting).
I have a client that has blanks in it's name (and, even if I wanted to,
I cannot change it -- it's encoded in firmware.)

The forward dynamic update gets into the dynamic zone file fine, with
the blanks encoded as \032 :

ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393  18000  IN  A   192.168.1.28   ;CL=2


I assumed that this was OK, since I figured that blanks might be a
problem :)

In fact, lookups *are* working fine:

herman# dig  'ORiNOCO RG-1000 01a393.dynamic.vance.'
   ...
;; QUERY SECTION:
;;      ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393.dynamic.vance, type = A, class = IN

;; ANSWER SECTION:
ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393.dynamic.vance.  5H IN A  192.168.1.47
   ...


'nslookup' has a little problem with the blank, but it also works if
I do the encoding for it:

herman# nslookup -d 'ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393.dynamic.vance.'
   ...
QUESTIONS:
        ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393.dynamic.vance, type = A, class = IN
    ANSWERS:
    ->  ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393.dynamic.vance
        internet address = 192.168.1.47
   ...


So I'm happy as a clam except for two things:

1) (this is really OT, but I thought I'd mention it for grins
   )
   'ping', 'telnet', etc. on Linux doesn't like the blank in the name
and just return "Unknown host" .
This appears to be a resolver library issue (original Linux programs),
since resolver code on both Win95 and HP-UX *do* accept blanks in the
names and 'ping' works fine against those names.

2) I happened to be looking in the syslog file while researching the
   aforementioned dhcpd problem (which is that dhcpd does *not* encode
correctly the reverse entry and it is, therefore, not entered into the
zone file correctly), and I saw the following BIND messages:

   ...
owner name "ha\032ri\032xx.dynamic.vance" IN (primary) is invalid -
proceeding anyway
master zone "dynamic.vance" (IN) loaded (serial 2001011121)
host name "ha\032ri\032xx.dynamic.vance" (owner
"45.1.168.192.dynamic.in-addr.arpa")
     IN (primary) is invalid - proceeding anyway
master zone "dynamic.in-addr.arpa" (IN) loaded (serial 2001011117)
   ...
owner name "ORiNOCO\032RG-1000\03201a393.dynamic.vance" IN (primary) is
invalid -
     proceeding anyway


The first two come from reloading the dynamic zones which include a
couple of test
updates using 'nsupdate'.

The third one comes because of the DHCP dynamic update.

In both cases (manual 'nsupdate' and DHCP dynamic update), the names
*are* added
to the zone, as I said above.

So, I guess the questions are:

Why is BIND complaining?
   (NOTE: both 8.2.2-p5 and 8.2.2-p7 make the same complaint.
   )
Should DHCP be encoding the name the way it does?
   (I'm thinking, "Yes", since 'dig' encodes it the same way for its
query.
   )






-------------------------------------------------
Tks        | <mailto:BVance at sbm.com>
BV         | <mailto:BobVance at alumni.caltech.edu>
Sr. Technical Consultant,  SBM, A Gates/Arrow Co.
Vox 770-623-3430           11455 Lakefield Dr.
Fax 770-623-3429           Duluth, GA 30097-1511
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