[TriLUG] dnsmasq

[Aaron S. Joyner]

Joseph Tate wrote:

>On 11/2/05, Alan Porter <porter at trilug.org> wrote:
>  
>
>>If you have a simple home network or a small office network,
>>I *highly* recommend a tool called 'dnsmasq'.  It is a simple
>>caching DNS server with an integrated DHCP server.
>>    
>>
>
>It's also useful if you frequent vpn links.  You can specify a set of
>hostnames and an  "upstream" dns server.  That way *.vpn.example.com
>resolves through 192.168.99.3 rather than $DHCPSUPPLIEDDNSSERVER
>
>--
>Joseph Tate
>Personal e-mail: jtate AT dragonstrider DOT com
>Web: http://www.dragonstrider.com
>  
>
zone "vpn.example.com" { forwarders { 192.168.99.3;  209.42.192.253; }; 
};  // done from memory, use with caution

This too can be done with BIND.  Note the convenient ability to specifiy 
a secondary name server, such that when the VPN link isn't available, 
the first DNS server (which I'm assuming would be on the other side of 
the VPN link) wouldn't be available, and thus you'd fall back to the 
secondary name server, which would be your normal forwarder, and would 
thus give you the regular answers you'd expect for a non-vpn-connected 
internet site, if appropriate (not likely in vpn.example.com, but 
perhaps useful in other situations).  I'm not saying dnsmasq isn't a 
handy and simple tool (I'm not familiar enough with it to say either 
way), but the feature in question isn't uncommon or difficult, it's just 
probably easier to find in the shorter documentation for dnsmasq, so the 
usefulness of this setup occurs to more people.  :)

Aaron S. Joyner