From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Jul 13 16:50:39 2009 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 732E4106566C for ; Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:50:39 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wmoran@potentialtech.com) Received: from mail.potentialtech.com (internet.potentialtech.com [66.167.251.6]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 451938FC08 for ; Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:50:39 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from wmoran@potentialtech.com) Received: from vanquish.ws.pitbpa0.priv.collaborativefusion.com (pr40.pitbpa0.pub.collaborativefusion.com [206.210.89.202]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by mail.potentialtech.com (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 62C54EBC0A; Mon, 13 Jul 2009 12:50:38 -0400 (EDT) Date: Mon, 13 Jul 2009 12:50:37 -0400 From: Bill Moran To: John Almberg Message-Id: <20090713125037.c060b962.wmoran@potentialtech.com> In-Reply-To: <8195A2D9-F7AC-49F8-969E-A13EDFA3C05A@identry.com> References: <8195A2D9-F7AC-49F8-969E-A13EDFA3C05A@identry.com> X-Mailer: Sylpheed 2.6.0 (GTK+ 2.14.7; i386-portbld-freebsd7.1) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Should DNS be on same server as webserver? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 13 Jul 2009 16:50:39 -0000 In response to John Almberg : > The other day, a FreeBSD 'expert' told me that it is important to > have the DNS server for a domain on the same server as the domain's > web server. Supposedly, this saves doing tons of DNS look ups over > the network. Instead, they are done locally. > > This makes sense to me, but I wonder if the performance difference is > really that significant? Don't know exactly how he phrased that statement, but it's truthfulness is highly dependent on the situation. It's possible (even recommended) to configure Apache not to do DNS lookups, which makes the statement rather moot. However, as a general rule, it's a good idea to have a fast DNS cache available to systems that will be doing a lot of lookups. In a typical configuration, a web server will do a lot of lookups. It doesn't _have_ to be on the same server, in fact, if you have multiple busy web servers, it's probably a better idea to dedicate a machine to doing DNS caching. Of course, if your hosting provider already provides a set of fast caches for you to use, it's not really necessary for you to set up your own. -- Bill Moran http://www.potentialtech.com http://people.collaborativefusion.com/~wmoran/