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using cacheing dns server

There are numerous "host2dns" scripts available (most of them use that name though of course you'd Google for "host to dns" - and have a hard time finding them that way!) that can save you a lot of trouble, typing and errors.

From: Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us>
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sco.misc
Subject: Re: network configuration woes,gateway,DNS
Date: Mon, 12 Jun 2000 15:53:02 -0700
Message-ID: <0gpaks0a5b1ktokjvs51cebgqro6dpavqo@4ax.com> 

On Mon, 12 Jun 2000 18:54:35 GMT, heed@heed.com (HeeD) wrote:

>On Tue, 30 May 2000 11:59:56 GMT, Jean-Pierre Radley <jpr@jpr.com>
>wrote:
>
>>Jeff Liebermann propounded (on Tue, May 30, 2000 at 12:01:34AM -0700):
>>|       domain          comix.santa-cruz.ca.us    
>>|       hostresorder    local bind                
>>|       nameserver      206.13.28.12  206.13.31.12
>>| Substitute your own ISP's DNS servers.
>>
>>One nameserver per keyword.  That should be
>>        domain  my.domain
>>        hostresorder local bind
>>        nameserver      d.e.f.g
>>        namesever       w.x.y.z
>
>But if nameserver is down, or internet connection is lost
>temporarily... then SCO goes brain-dead, with it taking many minutes
>to telnet in on the LAN for example.
>
>Is there easy way around this?

Yes.  Add all your fixed IP addresses on your local network to /etc/hosts.
If running Windoze, LanMan, or SMB networking, also add them to
/etc/lmhosts.  Similarly, add them to c:\windoze\hosts and lmhosts.
Since hostresorder looks for local name resolutions before going to the
internet for name resolution, you should not have any delays.  I keep one
copy of hosts and lhosts on all my machines with provisions for updating all
the others every time a change is made.  (Yeah, I know it's lots of work).

>I was told to run DNS on SCO machine but that seemed difficult and
>beyond my intelligence without more detailed instructions.

No guts, no gain.  Learn by Destroying.  Make backups and try setting up a
DNS server.  If it fails, go back to where you started.  Nothing is too
difficult to try if you can undo the mess afterwards.

DNS is the alternative to maintaining hosts and lmhosts.  It had the
advantage of centrally locating all the names and IP's so one does not need
to do all the updates as detailed above.  See:
How do I set up a primary nameserver and nameserver clients?
  http://aplawrence.com/cgi-bin/ta.pl?arg=107297
Also, go to:
  http://wdb1.sco.com/kb/search/
and use "dns server" as the search buzzword for additional help.

I use a  different approach to DNS.  I use a cacheing DNS server for my
internet gateway, firewall, NAT, etc.  I cache all DNS address lookups
including local addresses.  My workstations (clients) point to the cacheing
DNS server for address resolution instead of the worthless PacHell DNS
servers.  If my DSL line goes comatose or PacHell's worthless DNS servers go
dead, the local DNS cache will still resolve addresses.  The timeout on the
cacheing DNS server is short (5 seconds) and will return a "cannot resolve"
error message almost immediately if the DNS servers are unavailable.
        http://www.freesco.org  (That's Free Cisco, not Free SCO).
Incidentally, the firewall also has a dialup modem which will eventually
dial a different ISP if my DSL goes comatose.


-- 
Jeff Liebermann   jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us
150 Felker St #D  Santa Cruz CA  95060
831-421-6491 pager   831-429-1240 fax
http://www.cruzio.com/~jeffl/sco/   SCO stuff

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