DNS problem in Fedora 12
 

I am trying to set up a dns server to replace an older machine. The new dns server will have dns look-ups for a few machines inside the firewall and will be "caching" server for lookups to the rest of the world.

On my new dns server box:
I installed named. I copied my zone files from an old machine running Fedora 9. I updated /etc/named.conf, then I enabled named in system-config-services. I opened port 53 in system-config-firewall. Then I stopped SELINUX. Reboot.
Note, the following is a snippet from top part of named.conf:

allow-query { localhost; 192.168.0.0/24; };
allow-query-cache { localhost; 192.168.0.0/24; };

recursion yes;
forwarders {68.94.156.1; 68.94.157.1; };
-- code for zones is included in named.conf


Test 1 - On the new dns server:
nslookup hp.com localhost
works
nslookup xxx.mydomain.com localhost
works

Test 2 On the new dns server
nslookup hp.com
works
nslookup xxx.mydomain.com
fails. server can't find xxx.mydomain.com: NXDOMAIN

Test 3 On another machine
nslookup hp.com 192.168.xxx.xxx
fails. server can't find hp.com: NXDOMAIN
nslookup xxx.mydomain.com
fails. server can't find xxx.mydomain.com: NXDOMAIN

Conclusions (correct me if I am wrong):
The dns server appears to be up.
The dns server does not seem to be taking its local data as authoritive, and tries to go my ISP's DNS.
The dns server does not seem to be able to get anything from port 53.

Any clues? Anything that I should check? I appreciate help, clues etc.

Bill

Hi,

The dns server is up and its responding to queries. Just check /etc/resolv.conf to see if you have it as the 1st entry:
You don't need the forwarders statement, because your server will ask them to find the answer to a query. What you need is the hint "." zone, so your dns will work as a caching dns.

You can also limit recursion to LAN only, using:

i take it you do not mind NOT having any security updates .
fedora 9 running and installing fedora 12 ( in 6 mo. - no security updates)

you might want to use CentOS 5.5 for a dns server - it has a 5 year life span ( VS. fedora's 13 month)

Might I suggest using google's dns somewhere in this setup:
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4