Installing and Administering Internet Services

Chapter 3 97
Configuring and Administering the BIND Name Service
Configuring a Root Name Server
Configuring a Root Name Server
If you are connected to the Internet, use the root servers already
available. (For a list of root servers, use anonymous ftp to get the file
/domain/named.ca from nic.ddn.mil.) However, if you are on an
isolated network, you must set up your own root servers.
A root server does not have a cache line in its boot file. Instead, it has a
line like this, which indicates that the server is primary for the root
domain:
primary . db.root
The db.root file typically contains only NS and A resource records for
the authoritative name space tree. You can use the hosts_to_named
command with the -r option to create the db.root file. Type man
hosts_to_named for more information.
The db.cache file on the other name servers in the domain should
contain an entry for this root server.
A domain may have more than one root name server.
Following is an example of the root zone file, db.root. In the example
db.root file, hosts rabbit.div.inc.com, denny.dept.inc.com, and
sally.doc.inc.com are authoritative name servers for the root
domain. Hosts eduardo.inc.com and labs.inc.com are authoritative
for the inc.com subdomain.
@ IN SOA rabbit.div.inc.com.
root.moon.div.inc.com. (
3 ; Serial
10800 ; Refresh after 3 hours
3600 ; Retry after 1 hour
604800 ; Expire after 1 week
86400 ) ; Minimum ttl of 1 day
IN NS rabbit.div.inc.com.
IN NS denny.dept.inc.com.
IN NS sally.dept.inc.com.
rabbit.div.inc.com. 86400 IN A 15.19.8.119