SYNOPSIS

tinydns-edit data data.tmp add type name address

DESCRIPTION

tinydns-edit edits the data file, which is the source form of the database that is compiled by tinydns-data(8) and that is served by tinydns(8) and axfrdns(8). The update to data is performed atomically, by first writing the updated database content to the file data.tmp and then renaming data.tmp to data . The two files must, of course, reside on the same volume in order that this can be achieved.

On success, tinydns-edit returns zero. If, for any reason, an error occurs it will exit with a non-zero code and data will not be changed.

With the "add" verb, tinydns-edit appends to the database a record whose type is determined by type , with the fully-qualified name name and the IP address address . type can be one of:

ns

A '.' record is created. This record specifies that the domain name is published by a DNS content server that is listening on the IP address address .

The name of the DNS content server is not directly specifiable. Names are automatically assigned by tinydns-edit itself, following the pattern [a-z].ns.name . tinydns-edit will assign the first letter of the alphabet that is not already used in another '.' or '&' record as the name of a DNS content server. If no letters of the alphabet remain unused, tinydns-edit will fail.

If a '.' or '&' record for the domain already exists, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the new record for the same length of time as they are allowed to cache the existing records. Otherwise, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the record for up to 3 days.

childns

A '&' record is created. This record specifies that queries for names in the domain name should be referred to a ("child") DNS content server that is listening on the IP address address .

The name of the DNS content server is not directly specifiable. Names are automatically assigned by tinydns-edit itself, following the pattern [a-z].ns.name . tinydns-edit will assign the first letter of the alphabet that is not already used in another '.' or '&' record as the name of a DNS content server. If no letters of the alphabet remain unused, tinydns-edit will fail.

If a '.' or '&' record for the domain already exists, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the new record for the same length of time as they are allowed to cache the existing records. Otherwise, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the record for up to 3 days.

mx

A '@' record is created. This record specifies that mail to names in the domain name should be sent to an SMTP server that is listening on the IP address address .

The name of the SMTP server is not directly specifiable. Names are automatically assigned by tinydns-edit itself, following the pattern [a-z].mx.name . tinydns-edit will assign the first letter of the alphabet that is not already used in another '@' record as the name of an SMTP server. If no letters of the alphabet remain unused, tinydns-edit will fail.

It is not possible to specify the distance value for the SMTP server. tinydns-edit will leave that field blank, meaning that tinydns-data (8) will use whatever the default value is.

If a '@' record for the domain already exists, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the new record for the same length of time as they are allowed to cache the existing records. Otherwise, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the record for up to 1 day.

host

A '=' record is created, that proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache for up to 1 day. This record specifies that the name name maps to the IP address address and vice versa.

tinydns-edit will fail if a '=' record already exists that uses either name or address .

alias

A '+' record is created, that proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache for up to 1 day. This record specifies that the name name maps to the IP address address but that there is no reverse mapping.

Because this is an alias record, tinydns-edit will not fail if there happen to already be existing records that use address .

AUTHOR AND MODIFICATIONS

This manual page was created by Jonathan de Boyne Pollard on 2001-04-06.

2001-04-26: A new AUTHOR AND MODIFICATIONS section was added. axfrdns(8) is now mentioned. The description of how server names were auto-generated was clarified. A cut-and-paste error in the description of the "mx" type was corrected.