1. I'm still using version 1.0 of MaraDNS3. What license is MaraDNS released under?
4. How do I report bugs in MaraDNS?
5. Some of the postings to the mailing list do not talk about MaraDNS!
6. How do I get off the mailing list?
7. How do I set up reverse DNS on MaraDNS?
8. I am on a slow network, and MaraDNS can not process recursive queries
9. When I try to run MaraDNS, I get a cryptic error message.
10. After I start MaraDNS, I can not see the process when I run netstat -na
11. What string library does MaraDNS use?
12. Why does MaraDNS use a multi-threaded model?
13. I feel that XXX feature should be added to MaraDNS
14. I feel that MaraDNS should use another documentation format
15. Is there any process I need to follow to add a patch to MaraDNS?
16. Can MaraDNS act as a primary nameserver?
17. Can MaraDNS act as a secondary nameserver?
18. What is the difference between an authoritative and a recursive DNS server?
19. The getzone client isn't allowing me to add certain hostnames to my zone
21. Can I use MaraDNS in Windows?
22. MaraDNS freezes up after being used for a while
23. What kind of Python integration does MaraDNS have
24. Doesn't "kvar" mean "four" in Esperanto?
People who wish to run MaraDNS 1.0 unsupported after 2010/12/21 need to keep in mind that MaraDNS 1.0 is not Y2038 compliant, and will have problems starting in 2036 or so. MaraDNS 1.2, on the other hand, is fully Y2038 compliant.
There is still a FAQ for version 1.0 of MaraDNS available here.
Updating from 1.0 to 1.2 requires a minimum number of changes; with most configurations, MaraDNS 1.2 is fully compatible with MaraDNS 1.0 data files. Details are in the updating document in the tutorial.
While csv1 zone files are fully supported in MaraDNS 1.2, there is a Perl
script for updating from CSV1 to CSV2 zone files in the tools/
directory of MaraDNS 1.2.
2. How do I try out MaraDNS?
Read the quick start guide, which is the file named 0QuickStart in the MaraDNS distribution.
3. What license is MaraDNS released under?
MaraDNS 1.2 is released with the following two-clause BSD license:
BSD-type license:
Copyright (c) 2002-2005 Sam TrenholmeTERMS
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
This software is provided 'as is' with no guarantees of correctness or fitness for purpose.
This way, people who do not like this can set up mail filters to filter out anything that comes from this list and doesn't have [MARA] in the subject line, or simply unsubscribe from the list and read the list from the archives; if one needs to report a bug, they can subscribe to the list again, post their bug, then unsubscribe after a week.
Another option is to set up one's Freshmeat preferences to be notified in email every time I update MaraDNS at Freshmeat. This will give one email notice of any critical bug fixes without needing to be subscribed to the mailing list.
The web page http://www.maradns.org/
has a link to the mailing list archives.
6. How do I get off the mailing list?
Send an email to list-request@maradns.org with "unsubscribe" as the
subject line.
7. How do I set up reverse DNS on MaraDNS?
By using PTR (pointer) records. For example, the PTR record which performs
the reverse DNS lookup for the ip 1.2.3.4 looks like this in a CSV2 zone
file:
4.3.2.1.in-addr.arpa. PTR www.example.com.If you wish to have a PTR (reverse DNS lookup; getting a DNS name from a numeric IP) record work on the internet at large, it is not a simple matter of just adding a record like this to a MaraDNS zonefile. One also needs control of the appropriate in-addr.arpa. domain.
While it can make logical sense to contact the IP 10.11.12.13 when trying to get the reverse DNS lookup (fully qualified domain name) for a given IP, DNS servers don't do this. DNS server, instead, contact the root DNS servers for a given in-addr.arpa name to get the reverse DNS lookup, just like they do with any other record type.
When an internet service provider is given a block of IPs, they are also
given control of the DNS zones which allow them to control reverse DNS
lookups for those IPs. While it is possible to obtain a domain and run
a DNS server without the knowledge or intervention of an ISP, being
able to control reverse DNS lookups for those IPs requires ISP
intervention.
8. I am on a slow network, and MaraDNS can not process recursive
queries
MaraDNS, by default, only waits two seconds for a reply from a remote
DNS server. This default can be increased by adding a line like this
in the mararc file:
Note that making this too high will slow MaraDNS down when DNS servers are down, which is, alas, all too common on today's internet.timeout_seconds = 5
If MaraDNS does return a cryptic error message without letting you know
what is wrong, let me know
so that I can fix the bug. MaraDNS is designed
to be easy to use; cryptic error messages go against this spirit.
10. After I start MaraDNS, I can not see the process when I run netstat -na
Udp services do not have a prominent "LISTEN" when netstat is run.
When MaraDNS is up, the relevant line in the netstat output looks like this: udp 0 0 127.0.0.4:53 0.0.0.0:*
While on the topic of netstat, if you run netstat -nap as root,
you can see the names of the processes which are providing internet
services.
11. What string library does MaraDNS use?
MaraDNS uses its own string library, which is called the "js_string"
library. Man pages for most of the functions in the js_string library
are in the folder doc/man of the MaraDNS
distribution
12. Why does MaraDNS use a multi-threaded model?
The multi-threaded model is, plain and simple, the simplest way to write
a functioning recursive DNS server. There is a reason why MaraDNS, pdnsd, and
BIND 9 all use the multi-threaded model.
13. I feel that XXX feature should be added to MaraDNS
There are currently no plans to implement new features in MaraDNS. The reason for this is because, bottom line, MaraDNS has failed to make my resume impressive enough for me to easily get a job in today's job market.
Both the BIND and NSD name servers were developed by having the programmers paid to work on the programs. PowerDNS was originally commercial software with the author only reluctantly made GPL after seeing that the market for a commercial DNS server is very small. All of the other DNS servers which have been developed as hobbyist projects (Posadis, Pdnsd, and djbdns) are no longer being actively worked on by the primary developer.
If I were to work on MaraDNS again, it will be a complete rewrite in C++; if I can get C++ on my resume, I may be able to get a job more easily.
Like anything else, this is not absolute. For example, if I see a large
MaraDNS community and a strong demand for new features from that community,
I will change my mind. Should ipv6 start to become dominant, I will update
MaraDNS to have full ipv6 support. Should some other technology come along
that will require an update to MaraDNS for MaraDNS to continue to function
as a DNS server, I may update MaraDNS to use that technology.
14. I feel that MaraDNS should use another documentation format
The reason that MaraDNS uses its own documentation format is to satisfy both the needs of translators to have a unified document format and my own need to use a documentation format that is simple enough to be readily understood and which I can add features on an as needed basis.
The documentation format is essentially simplified HTML with some special tags added to meet MaraDNS' special needs.
This gives me more flexibility to adapt the documentation format to changing needs. For example, when someone pointed out that it's not a good idea to have man pages with hi-bit characters, it was a simple matter to add a new HIBIT tag which allows man pages to be without hi-bit characters, and other document formats to retain hi-bit characters.
Having a given program have its own documentation format is not
without precedent; Perl uses its own "pod" documentation format.
15. Is there any process I need to follow to add a patch to MaraDNS?
Yes.
Here is the procedure for making a proper patch:
Yes.
The zoneserver program serves zones so that other DNS servers can be secondaries for zones which MaraDNS serves. This is a separate program from the maradns server, which processes both authoritative and recursive UDP DNS queries.
See the DNS
master document in the MaraDNS tutorial for details.
17. Can MaraDNS act as a secondary nameserver?
Yes.
Please read the
DNS slave document, which is part of the MaraDNS tutorial.
18. What is the difference between an authoritative and a recursive DNS
server?
A recursive DNS server is a DNS server that is able to contact other DNS
servers in order to resolve a given domain name label. This is the kind
of DNS server one points to in /etc/resolve.conf
An authoritative DNS server is a DNS server that a recursive server
contacts in order to find out the answer to a given DNS query.
19. The fetchzone client isn't allowing me to add certain hostnames to
my zone
For security reasons, MaraDNS' fetchzone client does not
add records which are not part of the zone in question. For example,
if someone has a zone for example.com, and this record in the zone:
1.1.1.10.in-addr.arpa. PTR dns.example.com.
MaraDNS will not add the record, since the record is out-of-bailiwick. In other words, it is a host name that does not end in .example.com.
There are two workarounds for this issue:
MaraDNS will only compile on FreeBSD, Mac OS X, Cygwin, Linux, and
partially on MinGW32 systems. If you are interested in porting MaraDNS
to another system, please let me know.
21. Can I use MaraDNS in Windows?
Yes. There is both a partial mingw32 (native win32 binary) port and a full
Cygwin port of MaraDNS; both of these ports are part of the native build
of MaraDNS.
22. MaraDNS freezes up after being used for a while
If using your ISP's name servers or some other name servers which
are not, in fact, root name servers, please make sure that you are
using the upstream_servers dictionary variable instead of the
root_servers dictionary variable.
If you still see MaraDNS freeze up after making this correction, please
send a bug report to the mailing list.
23. What kind of Python integration does MaraDNS have
The mararc file uses the same syntax that Python uses; in fact, Python
can parse a properly formatted mararc file.
There is currently no other integration with Python.
24. Doesn't "kvar" mean "four" in Esperanto?
Indeed, it does. However the use of "kvar" in the MaraDNS source
code only coincidentally is an Esperanto word. "kvar" is short
for "Kiwi variable"; a lot of the parsing code comes from the code
used in the Kiwi spam filter project.
25. How scalable is MaraDNS?
MaraDNS is optimized for serving a small number of domains as quickly
as possible. That said, MaraDNS is remarkably efficnent for serving a
large number of domains, as long as the server MaraDNS is on has the
memory to fit all of the domains, and as long as the startup time for
loading a large number of domains can be worked around.
The "big-O" or "theta" growth rates for various MaraDNS functions are as follows, where N is the number of authoritative host names being served:
Startup time N Memory usage N Processing incoming DNS requests 1
As can be seen, MaraDNS will process 1 or 100000 domains in the same amount of time, once the domain names are loaded in to memory.