User Guide

34 Novell DNS/DHCP Management Utility Administration Guide
Novell DNS/DHCP Management Utility Administration Guide
103-000164-001
September 4, 2001
Novell Confidential
Manual 99a38 July 17, 2001
Traditional DNS
In the past, DNS has been administered by building a database of information
that includes all of a zone's resource records into a textual file. Novell's earlier
support of DNS used Btrieve as its database. Other vendors also use large files
to store the information required for a DNS zone. The administration of these
files is difficult and cumbersome.
Figure 5 on page 35 represents a traditional DNS strategy. A zone, such as
novell.com, uses a master DNS server to handle queries about the entities
within it. A DNS server might support more than one zone, and it would
probably have at least one secondary server for backup (redundancy) or load-
sharing purposes. The master DNS server provides DNS name service for two
zones: novell.com and other.com. The secondary DNS server provides backup
support for the novell.com zone, and the other secondary DNS server provides
backup support for the other.com zone.
Additionally, each name server maintains separate copies of the zone data for
primary and secondary support. When changes occur, all of these files require
updating with zone transfers, which greatly increases network bandwidth use.
PTR Domain name
PX Preference, Map 822 (domain name), and Map x400 fields
(domain name in X.400 syntax)
RP Responsible person's mailbox and TXT RR domain name
RT Preference and Intermediate fields
SRV Service, proto, priority, weight, port, and target fields
TXT Text field for up to 256 characters in multiple strings
WKS Protocol and bit map fields
X25 PSDN address
RR Type Field Differences