[dns-operations] Defining the "be like a root" problem

[paul vixie]

On 5/17/2012 9:58 PM, Paul Hoffman wrote:
> From looking at the thread, I'm not convinced that you are correct.
> The common definition of being a slave zone is that you are just as
> authoritative as the primary. To me, that means "act like a root
> server". Using "slave" as a verb seems to have the meaning "transfer
> the zone in order to act like a slave", but some people have talked
> about other ways of updating other than zone transfers.

let me clarify my own intention. if an rdns operator whose software is
also capable of slaving a zone wants to slave the root zone in order to
avoid going upstream to the roots to learn where 'com' is and in order
to be able to generate authoritative nxdomain responses without a round
trip, that's both an individual good and a greater good.

in no case would i advise any form of policy based routing or route
hijacking or anything else that would cause any dns initiator to end up
talking to this hybrid rdns+rootslave when they thought they were
talking to, or were in fact trying to talk to, a root name server.

it's just a way to hotwire the cache, not to change 'who is a root
server operator'.

paul

-- 
"I suspect I'm not known as a font of optimism." (VJS, 2012)