Address Conversion Functions and The Domain Name System

Refs: Chapter 9 RFC 1034 RFC 1035

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Hostnames
IP Addresses are great for computers
IP address includes information used for routing.

IP addresses are tough for humans to remember. IP addresses are impossible to guess.
ever guessed at the name of a WWW site?
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The Domain Name System

The domain name system is usually used to translate a host name into an IP address . Domain names comprise a hierarchy so that names are unique, yet easy to remember.
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DNS Hierarchy
edu rpi albany com org jp

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Host name structure

Each host name is made up of a sequence of labels separated by periods.
Each label can be up to 63 characters The total name can be at most 255 characters.

Examples:
whitehouse.gov barney.the.purple.dinosaur.com monica.cs.rpi.edu
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Domain Name
The domain name for a host is the sequence of labels that lead from the host (leaf node in the naming tree) to the top of the worldwide naming tree. A domain is a subtree of the worldwide naming tree.
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Top level domains

edu, gov, com, net, org, mil,

Countries each have a top level domain (2 letter domain name). New top level domains include:
.aero .biz .coop .info .name .pro

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DNS Organization
Distributed Database
The organization that owns a domain name is responsible for running a DNS server that can provide the mapping between hostnames within the domain to IP addresses. So - some machine run by RPI is responsible for everything within the rpi.edu domain.

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DNS Distributed Database

There is one primary server for a domain, and typically a number of secondary servers containing replicated databases. rpi.edu DNS server
rpi.edu DNS DB Authoritative Netprog: DNS and name lookups rpi.edu rpi.edu rpi.edu DNS DB DNS DB DNS DB Replicas 9

DNS Clients
A DNS client is called a resolver. A call to gethostbyname()is handled by a resolver (typically part of the client). Most Unix workstations have the file /etc/resolv.conf that contains the local domain and the addresses of DNS servers for that domain.
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/etc/resolv.conf
domain rpi.edu 128.113.1.5 128.113.1.3

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nslookup
nslookup is an interactive resolver that allows the user to communicate directly with a DNS server. nslookup is usually available on Unix workstations. (dig and host are also DNS clients).
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DNS Servers
Servers handle requests for their domain directly. Servers handle requests for other domains by contacting remote DNS server(s). Servers cache external mappings.

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Server - Server Communication

If a server is asked to provide the mapping for a host outside its domain (and the mapping is not in the server cache):
The server finds a nameserver for the target domain. The server asks the nameserver to provide the host name to IP translation.

To find the right nameserver, use DNS!

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DNS Data
DNS databases contain more than just hostname-to-address records:
Name server records Hostname aliases Mail Exchangers Host Information NS CNAME MX HINFO

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The Root DNS Server

The root server needs to know the address of 1st (and many 2nd) level domain nameservers. edu rpi albany
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com

org

jp

Server Operation
If a server has no clue about where to find the address for a hostname, ask the root server. The root server will tell you what nameserver to contact. A request may get forwarded a few times.
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DNS Message Format

HEADER QUERIES Response RESOURCE RECORDS Response AUTHORITY RECORDS
Response ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

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DNS Message Header

query identifier flags # of questions # of RRs # of authority RRs # of additional RRs
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16 bit fields

Response

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Message Flags
QR: Query=0, Response=1 AA: Authoritative Answer TC: response truncated (> 512 bytes) RD: recursion desired RA: recursion available rcode: return code
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Recursion
A request can indicate that recursion is desired - this tells the server to find out the answer (possibly by contacting other servers). If recursion is not requested - the response may be a list of other name servers to contact.
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Question Format
Name: domain name (or IP address) Query type (A, NS, MX, ) Query class (1 for IP)

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Response Resource Record

Domain Name Response type Class (IP) Time to live (in seconds) Length of resource data Resource data
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UDP & TCP

Both UDP and TCP are used:
TCP for transfers of entire database to secondary servers (replication). UDP for lookups If more than 512 bytes in response requestor resubmits request using TCP.

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Lots more
This is not a complete description ! If interested - look at:
RFC 1034: DNS concepts and facilities. RFC 1035: DNS implementation and protocol specification. play with nslookup. Look at code for BIND (DNS server code).
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Name to Address Conversion

There is a library of functions that act as DNS client (resolver).
you dont need to write DNS client code to use DNS!

With some OSs you need to explicitly link with the DNS resolver library:
-lnsl (nsl is Name Server Library)
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DNS library functions

gethostbyname gethostbyaddr gethostbyname2

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gethostbyname
struct hostent *gethostbyname( const char *hostname); struct hostent is defined in netdb.h: #include <netdb.h>

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struct hostent
struct hostent { official name (canonical) char *h_name; char **h_aliases; other names AF_INET or AF_INET6 int h_addrtype; address length (4 or 16) int h_length; char **h_addr_list; array of ptrs to addresses };
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hostent picture
h_name h_aliases h_addrtype h_length h_addr_list Official Name alias 1 alias 2
null

IP address 1 IP address 2
null

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Which Address?
On success, gethostbyname returns the address of a hostent that has been created.
has an array of ptrs to IP addresses Usually use the first one:

#define h_addr h_addr_list[0]

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gethostbyname and errors

On error gethostbyname return null. Gethostbyname sets the global variable h_errno to indicate the exact error:
HOST_NOT_FOUND TRY_AGAIN NO_RECOVERY NO_DATA NO_ADDRESS

All defined in netdb.h

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Getting at the address: char **h_addr_list;

h = gethostbyname("joe.com"); sockaddr.sin_addr.s_addr = *(h->h_addr_list[0]); This won't work!!!!
h_addr_list[0] is a char* !
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Using memcpy
You can copy the 4 bytes (IPv4) directly: h = gethostbyname("joe.com"); memcpy(&sockaddr.sin_addr, h->h_addr_list[0], sizeof(struct in_addr));
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Network Byte Order

All the IP addresses returned via the hostent are in network byte order! Repeat after me: "Thank you gethostbyname!"

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gethostbyaddr
struct hostent *gethostbyaddr( const char *addr size_t len, int family);

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Some other functions

uname : get hostname of local host getservbyname : get port number for a named service getservbyaddr : get name for service associated with a port number
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