[dns-operations] anybody from akadns here who can explain this referral?

[Paul Vixie]

my three questions are, why is there a referral at all, why is it upward,
and why is it incomplete?

re:

; <<>> DiG 9.4.0b4 <<>> @ns1-137.akam.net. www.akamai.ec9.net. in a
; (1 server found)
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 34893
;; flags: qr aa rd; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 8, ADDITIONAL: 8
;; WARNING: recursion requested but not available

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;www.akamai.ec9.net.            IN      A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
www.akamai.ec9.net.     21600   IN      CNAME   a152.g.akamai.net.

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
.                       1000    IN      NS      J.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      C.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      F.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      K.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      G.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      E.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      A.ROOT-SERVERS.net.
.                       1000    IN      NS      D.ROOT-SERVERS.net.

;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
J.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       192.58.128.30
C.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       192.33.4.12
F.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       192.5.5.241
K.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       193.0.14.129
G.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       192.112.36.4
E.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       192.203.230.10
A.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       198.41.0.4
D.ROOT-SERVERS.net.     1000    IN      A       128.8.10.90

;; Query time: 22 msec
;; SERVER: 193.108.91.137#53(193.108.91.137)
;; WHEN: Sun Mar  2 16:39:46 2008
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 325