Your basic dns records are as follows A = Address record, A records are used to map an IP address to a hostname or subdomain. CNAME = Canonical name, a CNAME record refereces another record, effectivley making it an alias, normaly used to map a subdomain to an existing domain. MX = Mail exchanger, an MX record specifies a mail server for the domain, normaly more than one will be specified and they will be given a priority to denote which server to try first (for backup mail servers etc) NS = Name server, an NS record lists the DNS servers responsible for the domain, again more than one can and normaly is provided so if the primary server fails a backup can be used. PTR = Pointer, a PTR record is used to resolve an ip address to a name, PTR records are what make reverse lookups work. SOA = Start of authority, a SOA record contains a lot of the basic information about the domain relating to how updates should be handled, primary name server and contact detail. Example files: ------------------- - = SOA record = - ------------------- @ IN SOA ns0.mydomain.com. hostmaster.mydomain.com. ( 2005081701 ; Serial 10800 ; Refresh 3600 ; Retry 3600000 ; Expire 86400 ) ; Minimum ================================================================== ------------------- - = MX Record2 = - ------------------- MX 5 mx1.mydomain.com. MX 5 mx2.mydomain.com. ================================================================== ------------------ - = NS Records = - ------------------ IN NS ns1.mydomain.com. IN NS ns2.mydomain.com. ================================================================== ---------------- - = A Records = - ---------------- @ IN A 192.168.10.30 cvs IN A 192.168.10.40 These effectivley map mydomain.com to 192.168.10.30 (yes, i know it's invalid!) and cvs.mydomain.com to 192.168.10.40. It's worth noting this a record is special since the "@" means all destinations not setup in the zone file for this domain goto this, this is effectivley the "base" level of the dns. ================================================================== ---------------------- - = CNAME Record = - ---------------------- www IN CNAME mydomain.com. This maps the www subdomain (yes, it is actualy a subdomain :O) to mydomain.com, any changes made to the record for mydomain.com automatically filter back to www, www.mydomain.com will map to 192.168.10.10(or what ever IP it is supose to map to), subdomains can basicly be pointed anywhere you want to point them. I've not listed a PTR record in this zone file because well, it wouldnt go in one, the PTR records would go into a zone file for the IP range as oppsed to the hostname, such a file would be named 10.168.192.in-addr.arpa and the PRT records would be specified using the last octet. So for mydomain.com we'd have a PTR record like this 30 IN PTR mydomain.com. ========== Your not so basic DNS records ======== SPF: Sender Policy FRamework These are entries in DNS that tell smtp servers who is allowed to send email out as the domain the DNS records are for. example: mydomain.net text = "v=spf1 a ip4:192.168.22.254 include:email-services.com -all" Types: a = A record mx = MX record include = inclde this domain prt = pointer records, actually I believe this cold be IP or domain. Note: The RFC states that there should be only one record. 10 entries(good luck). Common errors are "to many DNS lookups", invalid include, some domains will reject mail if there are to many lookups. SRV: Service records This entry advertises services availablea. I have seen sip service like Lync. example: Example of a SRV record, that specifies that a SIP/UDP server, with a priority of 10, can be contacted at asterisk.mynet.local, on port 5060. _sip._udp.mynet.local. 86400 IN SRV 10 5 5060 asterisk.mynet.local. SIP clients use SRV lookups to determine where to send an outgoing call. Configuring a DNS SRV records means that you can use your domain name rather than the full host name of the server in the SIP address you give to people. For example, without SRV records, people can only call me on 400@asterisk.lithnet.local. If I configure the SRV record shown in the example above, I can drop the hostname, and people can call me on 500@lithnet.local. See also: Solaris_notes/DomainNameServices