ChorusOS man pages section 1M: System Management Utilities

named(1M)

NAME

named- Internet domain name system (DNS)

SYNOPSIS

named

-d

debuglevel

-p

port#

-(b|c)

config file

-f

-r

-v

-u

user name

-g

group name

-t

directory

-w

directory

config file

DESCRIPTION

named is the Internet domain name server. See RFC 1033, RFC 1034, and RFC 1035 for more information on the Internet name-domain system. Without any arguments, named will read the default configuration file /etc/named.conf, read any initial data, and listen for queries. A config_file argument given at the end of the command line will override any config_file specified by using the -b or -c flags.

Several named options, and much of its behavior can be controlled in the configuration file. Please refer to named.conf.4cc for further information.

OPTIONS

-d debuglevel

Print debugging information. debuglevel is a number which determines the level of messages to be printed. If this number is negative, debuglevel is set to 1.

The configuration file logging statement allows for multiple, distinct levels of debugging for each of a large set of categories of events (such as queries, transfers in or out, and so on). Please refer to named.conf.4cc for further information about these extensive capabilities.

-p port#

Use the remote port number specified. This is the port number to which named will send queries. The default value is the standard port number, that is, the port number returned by getservbyname for the domain service.

The listen-on clause of the options statement in the configuration file can be used to change the port number which is bound locally by named.

-(b|c) config file

Use an alternative config_file. This argument is overridden by any config_file which is specified at the end of the command line. The default value is /etc/named.conf.

-f

Run this process in the foreground. Do not fork(2)and run as a daemon. The -f option is set by default.

-r

Turns off recursion in the server. Answers can come only from local (primary or secondary) zones. This can be used on root servers. The default is to use recursion.

The recursion clause of the configuration file options statement is preferred to the -r option. recursion can also override -r.

-v

Report the version and exit.

-u user name

Specifies the user identity which the server assumes after it initializes. The value specified may be either a username or a numeric user id. If the -g flag is not specified, then the group id used will be the primary group of the user specified (initgroups() is called, so all the user groups will be available to the server).

-g groupname

Specifies the group identity which the server assumes after it initializes. The value specified may be either a group name or a numeric group id.

-t directory

Specifies the directory which the server selects to be the root using chroot(). This is performed as soon as the server has finished processing command line arguments.

-w directory

Sets the working directory of the server. The directory clause of the configuration file options statement overrides any value specified on the command line. The default working directory is the current directory (".").

In order to comply with older implementations, any additional argument is taken as the name of the configuration file. As noted above, this argument overrides any config_file specified by the use of the -b or -c flags. If no further argument is given, the default configuration file is used (/etc/named.conf).

MASTER FILE FORMAT

The master file consists of control information and a list of resource records for objects in the master file zone. This information takes the following forms:

$INCLUDE <fileneame> <opt_domain>
$ORIGIN <domain>
$TTL <ttl>
<domain> <opt_ttl> >opt_class> <type> <resource_record_data>

Definitions:

domain

This field is "." for root, "@" for the current origin, or a standard domain name. If domain is a standard domain name that does not end with ".", the current origin is appended to the domain. Domain names ending with "." are unmodified.

opt domain

This field is used to define an origin for the data in an included file. It is equivalent to placing a $ORIGIN statement before the first line of the included file. This field is optional. Neither the opt_domain field nor $ORIGIN statements in the included file modify the current origin for that file.

ttl

An integer number that sets the default time-to-live for future records which do not have an explicit ttl.

opt ttl

An optional integer number for the time-to-live field. If not set, the ttl is taken from the last $TTL statement. If no $TTL statement has been provided, the Start Of Authority (SOA) minimum value is used and a warning is generated.

opt class

The object address type. Currently only one type is supported, for objects connected to the DARPA Internet.

type

This field contains one of the tokens listed below. The data expected in the resource_record_data field is in parentheses:

A: Host address (dotted-quad IP address).
NS: Authoritative name server (domain).
MX: A mail exchanger (domain), preceded by a preference value (0..32767), with lower numeric values representing higher logical preferences.
CNAME: the canonical name for an alias (domain).
SOA: Marks the start of a zone of authority (domain of originating host, domain address of maintainer, a serial number and the following parameters in seconds: refresh, retry, expire and minimum TTL (see RFC 883 and RFC 2308).
NULL: A null resource record (no format or data) .
RP: A Responsible Person for a certain domain name (mailbox, TXT-referral).
PTR: A domain name pointer (domain).
HINFO: Host information (cpu_type OS_type).

Resource records normally end at the end of a line, but may be continued across lines between opening and closing parentheses. Comments are introduced by semicolons and continue to the end of the line.

Note -

There are other resource record types not shown here. You should consult the BIND Operations Guide ("BOG") for the complete list. Some resource record types may have been standardized in newer RFCs, but have not yet been implemented in this version of BIND.

SOA FILE FORMAT

Each master zone file should begin with an SOA record for the zone. An example SOA record is as follows:

@ IN SOA ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU. rwh.ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU. (
                          1989020501 ; serial
                          10800 ; refresh
                          3600 ; retry
                          3600000 ; expire
                          86400 ) ; minimum

The SOA specifies a serial number, which should be changed each time the master file is changed. Note that although the serial number can be given as a dotted number, this not recommended as translation to normal integers is performed via concatenation rather than by multiplication and addition. You can spell out the year, month, day of month, and 0..99 version number and still fit the serial number within the unsigned 32-bit size of this field.

Secondary servers check the serial number at intervals specified in seconds by the refresh time. If the serial number changes, a zone transfer will be performed to load the new data. If a master server cannot be contacted when a refresh is due, the retry time specifies the interval at which refreshes should be attempted again. If a master server cannot be contacted within the interval given by the expire time, all data from the zone is discarded by secondary servers. The minimum value is the cache time-to-live for negative answers (RFC 2308).

NOTES

The following signals have the specified effect when sent to the server process using the kill(1)command:

SIGHUP: Causes server to read named.conf and reload the database. If the server is built with the FORCED_RELOAD compile-time option, then SIGHUP will also cause the server to check the serial number on all secondary zones. Normally, the serial numbers are only checked at the SOA-specified intervals.
SIGINT: Dumps the current data base and cache into /var/tmp/named_dump.db or into the file named by the value of _PATH_DUMPFILE, if it is specified.
SIGILL: Dumps statistical data into named.stats if the server is compiled with -DSTATS. Statistical data is appended to the file.
SIGSYS: Dumps the profiling data into /var/tmp if the server is compiled with profiling (server forks, chdirs and exits).
SIGTERM: Saves any modified dynamic zones to the file system, and shuts down the server.
SIGUSR1: Turns on debugging. Each SIGUSR1 increments the debug level. (SIGMET on older systems without SIGUSR1).
SIGUSR2: Turns off debugging completely. (SIGFPE on older systems without SIGUSR2).
SIGWINCH: Toggles logging of all incoming queries via syslog(8) (requires the server to have been built with the QRYLOG option).

FILES

/etc/named.conf: default name server configuration file
/var/run/named.pid (_PATH_PIDFILE): the process id
/var/tmp/named_dump.db (_PATH_DUMPFILE): name server database dump
/var/tmp/named.run (file: _PATH_DEBUG): debug output
/var/tmp/named.stats (file: _PATH_STATS): name server statistical data

ATTRIBUTES

See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:

ATTRIBUTE TYPE	ATTRIBUTE VALUE
Interface Stability	Evolving