name server IP vs web server IP

Question

I'm doing a course on an introduction to networks and I'm struggling to visualise certain aspects of the domain name system database. (if that is worded correctly?)

For example, if you perform nslookup on koreatimes.co.kr you get a non-authoritative IP address: 121.78.129.100.

This IP address is different from all 3 name servers' IP addresses found using nslookup -type=NS. I guess this makes sense as the IP address of a name server would be the address of a server which has assigned an IP address to a sub-server (web-server) identified by the domain name IP (or virtual server in a shared hosting plan). Am I correct?

Finally, how can I get an authoritative answer as to the IP address of koreatimes.co.kr? I assume I have to somehow query one of the name servers directly? How can I do this on terminal (mac) using nslookup or something similar like dig

Please excuse any errors of terminology that I am making. I'm still very unsure of all of this.

thanks for the thumbs down. if I'd known why the question was worth a down vote perhaps i wouldn't need to ask it — Zach Smith, Apr 18 '14 at 10:39
@ZachSmith Welcome to ServerFault, please read the [this](http://serverfault.com/help/on-topic) for a glance of what's on-topic on this site. — dawud, Apr 18 '14 at 10:53
thank you the question has been asked in the wrong place now — Zach Smith, Apr 18 '14 at 11:36

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 18 '14 at 11:42

You can't find THE ip address for a domain. A domain will have several addresses for dns, some for web servers, some for email, etc.

Each of these services is often hosted on completely different servers.

DNS uses different record types to point to some specific services: MX records specify where to send email. NS records specify where to send DNS queries. A records for most other things.

name server IP vs web server IP

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