I am setting up Bind for the first time and reading through the O'rielly book. I have both the third and fourth editions. It tells me where and how to download the latest version but doesnt tell me how or what the command or directory is to see if I already have it installed..

Also is this something I have to enable and if so whats the command??

And finally .. where are the db. files that its talking about.. I found some ***.zone files in my /var/named directory but was wondering if this was due to the version I had installed..

Any clarification would be greatly appreciated.

woz

I would say that you already have bind installed since you could find the /var/named/ directory.
This is where bind store the database.
Bind has to be started and to make that when you boot to your usual run level you can probably
run the command ntsysv. This command shows you what is loaded in the current run-level.
Locate the named and press <space> to mark it if it isn't already, then <tab> to ok an press <space>.
This should start named at boot. To check if it's running try this ps aux|grep named

Depending on the distribution and version there might be some gui like configuration tools for you,
I have been using Red Hat 7.1 and it has got a tool for it in the "start"-menu.