QWest is having some pretty nice DNS issues right now

Mon Jan 9 18:47:51 UTC 2006

--On January 9, 2006 5:30:12 PM +0000 "Christopher L. Morrow" 
<christopher.morrow at mci.com> wrote:

> What's interesting to me, atleast, is that this is about the 5th time
> someone has said similar things in the last 6 months: "DNS is harder than
> I thought it was" (or something along that line...)
>
> So, do most folks think:
> 1) get domain-name
> 2) get 2 machines for DNS servers
> 3) put ips in TLD system and roll!
>
> It seems like maybe that is all too common. Are the 'best practices'
> documented for Authoritative DNS somewhere central? Are they just not well
> publicized? Do registrars offer this information for end-users/clients? Do
> they show how their hosted solutions are better/works/in-compliance-with
> these best practices? (worldnic comes to mind)
>
> Should this perhaps be better documented and presented at a future NANOG
> meeting? (and thus placed online in presentation format)

Also it should be noted that there's a general lack of understanding about 
how very crucial DNS resolver performance is in the end user/customer 
perception of a network's performance.  I can't tell you how many times 
I've used a local resolver, even on a modem mind you, and seen a dramatic 
improvement in the end user experience, which is, the web browser.  Other 
applications are pretty DNS bound too anymore.  And many large ISPs 
overload their resolvers, or have resolvers not prepared/configured to 
handle the amount of queries they're getting.  I'm not saying I know the 
answers there, I'm just saying that I've seen quite a few times where DNS 
(or even other central directories, LDAP, ActiveDirectory come to mind) 
have been the 'bottleneck' from a user standpoint since name resolution 
would take so long.

>
> -Chris
>
>

--
"Genius might be described as a supreme capacity for getting its possessors
into trouble of all kinds."
-- Samuel Butler