Testing new nameservers using dig

Question

I have a domain, example.co.uk, and it has its nameservers registered with the registrar as current-nameserver.co.uk. It has a TXT record with value ORIGINAL.

I decide to change DNS providers to new-nameserver.co.uk. As a test, I set the TXT record to have the value NEW.

The idea to test the new server is lookup the TXT record and see what is returned,

However, I try:

dig @new-nameserver.co.uk example.co.uk TXT

Despite trying numerous combinations of command, the value ORIGINAL is always returned.

Why is this? And how can I preventa DNS server from providing an authoritative answer, as it appears it is aware that is not part of the normal chain as not registered with the parent nameserver.

Is there a command line option available, or is overiding the root nameserver (as in Testing nameserver configuration using it ) the only option?

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jan 14 '13 at 08:45

0

The only way yo force DNS server provide an authoritative answer is to make it primary or secondary for that zone:

zone "example.co.uk" IN {
    type master;
    # ...other options
}

zone "example.co.uk" in {
   type slave;
   # ...other options
}

answered Jan 14 '13 at 08:45

dchirikov

640
4
6

Thanks. The new-nameserver is already setup as a Primary zone (using Amazon Route 53), it has SOA etc. The dig/nslookup commands always just ignore my server preference and start a full search from root-server. – Jan 14 '13 at 13:18
What does `dig @new-nameserver.co.uk example.co.uk ns` say? – dchirikov Jan 14 '13 at 13:26

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 15 '13 at 16:00

Some ideas, off the top of my head:

Is "new-nameserver.co.uk" a recursive server, an authoritative server, or both? Have you tried giving the +norec flag to dig to disable recursion?
What does the SOA record for the containing zone say? I would advise upping the serial number on the new server, reloading the zone, and doing an SOA query, then looking carefully at the serial number returned. If you're not getting the new serial number then something is going wrong with reloading your zone data.
You are reloading your zone data after making changes to the zone file, aren't you?

Testing new nameservers using dig

2 Answers2