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To: root@spiffy.cybernet.com
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Subject: Re: gethostbyXXX() blocking too long 
In-reply-to: Your message of "Fri, 17 Nov 1995 15:25:25 EST."
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Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 16:48:02 -0500
From: Ken Hornstein <kenh@cmf.nrl.navy.mil>
Sender: owner-hackers@freebsd.org
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>For quite some time now, our site has been plagued by long delays
>during connecting to machines on the Internet.  The connection is
>established quickly, followed by LONG delays in getting any data,
>login prompt, etc.  I think that I've stumbled upon the answer.
>[...]

Actually, this isn't the problem.

Even if you don't have PTR records in DNS, a gethostbyname() should still
return quickly.  (Try to look up a nonexistant record in DNS.  It will return
quickly.  Well, it will return quickly if it can contact the nameserver that
is authoritative for the domain).

The _real_ problem is that your in-addr domain is totally hosed up.  The NIC
says the following machines are your servers for your in-addr domain:

   Domain System inverse mapping provided by:

   HEIFETZ.MSEN.COM             148.59.1.1
   GARNET.MSEN.COM              148.59.1.11
   NS1.OAR.NET                  192.88.193.144

However, if you check these machines, they don't contain zone information for
your in-addr domain.

What you need to do is either get these sites to insert zone information,
or point the NIC at the correct nameservers that do.  You don't actually
need PTR records in the zone; you just need a reachable nameserver that
knows about your zone so it can say, "Nope, sorry".

As a side note, it's worth pointing out that some ftp servers do require
a PTR record (ftp.uu.net does, for example), so it might be worth putting
in a bunch of dummy PTR records for all the hosts in your subnet.

--Ken