No subject

and change records and that the result is propogated to their nameservers.

>Their help file says when creating the "A" record that a fully
>qualified domain name may be entered instead of an IP address. This
>seems unlikely from what I have learned so far.
>
If you use their Web form, follow their instructions.  They're there for a
reason.

>To check this out I entered the (valid) URL *fp.bryant1.f9.co.uk* for
>the "A" record for the domain and the www subdomain. As I expected,
>they don't work. The domain is *link42.co.uk*
>
There are many things wrong with this statement.
a) This is not a URL.  A URL consists of several parts: 1) a protocol,
    2) a fully qualified  IP name or address, 3) a part. (i'm simplifying
here).
b) It's not a valid IP name.  Asterisks are not allowed in names.
c) You don't own the f9 domain or any part of it.  According to your own
statements you own the link42.co.uk domain (and not *link42.co.uk). You may
own addresses within this domain, in which case they must be of the form

www.link42.co.uk or fp.link42.co.uk. The period before the domain is
important
and required.

>Have I misunderstood or can an "A" record really contain an URL
>instead of an IP?
>
	You really have misunderstood. I have no idea what you mean by having
an A record contain a URL (according to your definition of URL). However, an
A Record MUST contain an IP address.

Here's what Dig has to say about your domain, FWIW.

dig link42.co.uk

; <<>> DiG 8.3 <<>> link42.co.uk
;; res options: init recurs defnam dnsrch
;; got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 4
;; flags: qr aa rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 2, ADDITIONAL: 0
;; QUERY SECTION:
;;      link42.co.uk, type = A, class = IN

;; ANSWER SECTION:
link42.co.uk.           1D IN A         212.19.79.40

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
link42.co.uk.           1D IN NS        ns1.ukdnsservers.co.uk.
link42.co.uk.           1D IN NS        ns2.ukdnsservers.co.uk.

;; Total query time: 1000 msec
;; FROM: tecotoo to SERVER: default -- 208.218.130.4
;; WHEN: Tue Oct 17 22:18:03 2000
;; MSG SIZE  sent: 30  rcvd: 100

		Danny