From owner-freebsd-questions Sun Mar 12 16:33:22 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from ren.sasknow.com (h139-142-245-96.ss.fiberone.net [139.142.245.96]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B1E9637B844 for ; Sun, 12 Mar 2000 16:33:14 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from ryan@sasknow.com) Received: from localhost (ryan@localhost) by ren.sasknow.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id SAA08483; Sun, 12 Mar 2000 18:33:10 -0600 (CST) (envelope-from ryan@sasknow.com) Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 18:33:10 -0600 (CST) From: Ryan Thompson To: Doug Barton Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: CNAME vs A records (clarification) In-Reply-To: <38CC21C7.4216AC42@gorean.org> Message-ID: Organization: SaskNow Technologies [www.sasknow.com] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Doug Barton wrote to Ryan Thompson: > I knew this post was coming as soon as I saw your post to the list. > What you're discussing are style issues. I wouldn't ever bring up the > topics you're discussing with someone new to DNS, they just get too far > into details that shouldn't be addressed with someone who doesn't even > know what A and CNAME records are. Someone who doesn't know what A and CNAME records are shouldn't really be running a nameserver in the first place... But I believe you're getting a wee bit far afield. (And, truly, so am I, but for the moment, I shall continue :-) However, talking to someone new to DNS is not a valid reason to gloss over important intricies of DNS. As well, -questions goes to archives and the mailboxes of users the world over. Someone, somewhere may (nay, WILL) find the information useful. (And so might the original poster, if not at this moment). But, this is more about philosophy than DNS, so I'll stop now :-) > Ryan Thompson wrote: > > > > Doug Barton wrote to Matthew Joseff: > > > > > Matthew Joseff wrote: > > > > > > > > Can someone correct and/or confirm my understanding of CNAME vs A records: > > > > > > > > CNAME should be used for a host that exists on (potentially) another > > > > server but uses that domain. > > > > > > > > A records should be used as an alias for a host but co-exists with other > > > > hosts. > > > > > > There is no such concept as "alias" in DNS. Erase it from your > > > mind. > > > > Sorry, Doug, but I'm afraid you are wrong. CNAME records are just > > that--aliases that point to a host's canonical name. > > Show me the word "alias" in the definition of any RR in any RFC. The > fact that "DNS and BIND" chooses to use this extremely bad and > potentially confusing definition aside.