[dns-operations] "best practices" for restaring internal DNS servers

[Stefan Foerster]

Hello world,

I am by no means an experienced nameserver operator, so chances are
that this is a stupid question. Please tell me if that's the case.

Given the crappy resolvers I encountered at many ISPs, I've been
running recursive resolvers at quite a few sites. As long as these are
up and running, they will reduce the load the internal clients/servers
cause on the DNS root and g(TLD) servers, especially in DNS intensive
environments like e.g. DNSBL lookups caused on sites receiving a lot
of mails.

Unfortunately, there are situations that call for those servers to be
restarted (updates to system libraries, OS kernel, the DNS software
itself). This will increase the load my network causes on the global
DNS infrastructure.

Are there any recommendations on how to deal with this situations with
regards to not putting more of a strain on the root/(g)TLD servers
than absolutely necessary?


Regards,
Stefan