Changing hosting company for one domain, how to deal with DNS?
 

Hello,

Our organization is planning to move one domain from Dreamhost to Hubspot. Let's say, it is gem.xyxyxyxyx.com. Please note, the website is not being migrated from one server to another, it is just hosting company.

Here is from our internal DNS master server -

And this is root domain A record -
Ideally, (I assume) when we move hosting agency, we get new IP and replace 69.163.167.103 and 69.163.164.199 with the IPs they will give.

But here twist is, HubSpot is only able to host content for subdomains using CNAME records. They provide a CNAME address that can be used (the associated IP address is dynamic and will not be static for security purposes). But our DNS records, both hosted as A records, at present.
HubSpot is unable to offer IP addresses for use with A records. They replied "We usually rely on the redirection services that DNS providers sometimes offer, but in the event that the DNS provider does not have a means of redirecting the root domain to the subdomain, we typically recommend a third party redirection service. I'd suggest setting up an account with Redirect.pizza".

My concerns is, for an enterprise-level DNS, will it not be difficult to trust on a free service website (https://redirect.pizza)? . If it breaks sometime, all our domains/sub-domains depending on it, can go down. Can anyone suggest more stable (even if it paid) provider for this purpose?

PS. Moving to HubSpot is decided by upper management, so that is not a changeable decision.

Thanks in advance.

Have your upper management sign off on the redirect shambles, get your CV in order and leave?
If management are morons you don't want to be there but you do want proof you didn't agree with them so they can't sue.

To me "changing hosting providers" means moving the content to a different server.
If the IP address is going to change that means the content is moving to a different server.

If what you mean is that the servers connection to the 'net is going to move to a different provider, and that provider doesn't supply a static IP address, then I have to agree with 273. That's not a place you want to work, or a situation you want to be responsible for supporting.

That said, hubspot appears to be a software provider, not a hosting company.

Do you manage and control the authoritative DNS for your domain? Does hubspot understand that?

Maybe more importantly, do the people that comprise "upper management" understand that?

This whole scenario reminds me of the days when we would learn that a manager was flying to a conference leaving us to wonder what fresh horror they might read about in the in-flight magazine that would become our new top priority upon their return.

I used to have a server on a dynamic IP (my home server) using dyndns.org to provide the translation from my domain name. It worked very well and was not expensive. I've stopped trying to do my own email, etc. since then but it could work for you.

Yes, we manage and control the authoritative DNS for our domain. Upper management had a discussion with some 'senior architect' and decided that. Upon asking for more information, it came on us "we expect SA to provide options and figure out, how we can achieve it" :-)

I agree with you guys, it is not an ideal world here, so I am trying to search for options.

On HubSpot side, they stated - "The CNAME address to point the "www" and "gem" subdomains to is below:
202320.chgz.sites.hubspot.net
The pages have been moved to their respective domains in HubSpot and are awaiting DNS changes. The pages are no longer accessible for view by the staging domain and can only be accessed through the editor. Once the DNS changes are made and resolve, the pages should be viewable on your "www" and "gem" subdomains."

I am not very proficient in DNS, still learning on it. I read some more and another option can be, configure simple webserver at our premises which will serve only xyxyxyxyx.com name and its IP address. In webserver configure setup redirection to www.xyxyxyxyx.com (which is defined as CNAME to Hubspot). I am yet to get a full understanding, if this can be a feasible option.
-------update----
I was writing the same time when @smallpond suggested his solution. Probably, we are talking about same approach?

My DNS is rusty, but as I recall, CNAMEs point to domain names, not IP addresses, so create the CNAME records and remove the A records for www. and gem. and you should be done. You will no longer reference an IP address for those sub domains

EDIT: Something like this:

I am looking at this option. But I have A record for root domain also. How to deal with that ?
xyxyxyxyx.com is root domain and gem.xyxyxyxyx.com is sub-domain under that.

To where do you want the root domain to resolve? The same as the sub domains? Someplace else?

I'm not sure CNAME is an "option," given the quote you posted from hubspot. That's what you need to do to comply with what hubspot (and your management) wants...but you need to do that instead of the A record(s).

That said, you also posted that the NS for your domain is at dreamhost.com, which would make it seem that that is the authoritative name server for the domain. We can't check that, but a should identify the authoritative name server.

It shows me :

Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.networksolutions.com
Registrar URL: http://networksolutions.com
Name Server: DNS1.TCS-SB.NET
Name Server: DNS2.TCS-SB.NET
Name Server: DNS3.TCS-SB.NET
Name Server: DNS4.TCS-SB.NET

And these 4 NS are our external DNS servers, owned by us. Below output is from Master server (ext-dns-ns1). It is same server DNS1.TCS-SB.NET

OK. Seems you know which is authoritative name server.

About your other question - you didn't answer:
To where do you want the root domain to resolve? The same as the sub domains? Someplace else?

Root domain also will go to hubspot. But for root domain, as I understand, we HAVE TO have IP address, not CNAME. That is the main problem which we are trying to solve with redirection service

Then replace the A records for all three with the CNAME record as directed by hubspot.

There's a lot of documentation about CNAME records. From Wikipedia:
(emphasis added -- this is the direction to remove the A record)

Thanks. It was detailed and helpful.
Instead of using external redirect services, I will be setting up my own webserver for this setup and hopefully, that would serve the purpose.

BTW, how do I give "Rep". I don't see any link of what you mentioned "If someone helps you, or you approve of what's posted, click the Rep: link at the left "

What? You don't need to set up anything. Just do what your vendor (hubspot) says: Add the CNAME records in your domain's authoritative name server and remove the A records they're replacing.
I'm not aware of any requirement that the root domain entry has to have an IP address. Where did you get that?
As long as the CNAME record resolves, that's all that's required for things to work.
Of course, if you want the root domain to resolve differently, then yes, you'll need a different DNS entry for it.
The Rep: link is below the poster's name, next to the green bar...but you can't do both that and the "helpful" link, which you already did...thank you.