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Domain Name System (DNS) notes Computer Network MSBTE I scheme 5th sem
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38 views9 pagesDomain Name System Notes
Domain Name System (DNS) notes Computer Network MSBTE I scheme 5th sem
Uploaded by
sthapanaCopyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF or read online on Scribd
/ 9
eee
consists of two simp
le data elements namely -
_ Variable and Value.
f four ;
ments | 5:19 Domain Name System (DNS) : |
s and
Addressing :
mmunication to take place successfully, the
-. For co
jave addresses and
sender and receiver both should hi
_ they should be known to each other.
The addressing in application program is different from
that in the other layers. Each program will have its own
address format. For example an e-mail address is like
[email protected] where as the address to access a web
page is like http +// wew.google.com/
It is important to note that there is an alias name fo
program uses
r the
address of remote host. The application
an alias name instead of an IP address.
This type of address is very convenient for the human
beings to remember and use. But it is not suitable for
the IP protocol.
So the alias address has to be mapped to the IP
address. For this an application program needs service
of another entity.
This entity is an application program called DNS. Note
that DNS is not used directly by the user. It is used by
another application programs for carrying out the
and
and
mapping.
= aad
© Scanned with OKEN Scanner ACN (Comp. /Sem. 5/MSBTE)
5.19.1 How does DNS Work ?
Jo map a name onto an IP address, an apptication
program calls a library procedure called the resolver.
‘The name is passed on to the resolver as a parameter,
‘The resolver sends a UDP packet to 8 local ONS server
which looks up the name and returns the corresponding
IP address to the resolver.
The resolver then sends this address to the caller. Then
the program can establish a TCP connection with the
destination or sends in the UDP packets.
5.49.2 Name Space :
= The names assigned to machines should be selected
carefully from the name space. There should be a
complete control over the relation between the names
and the IP addresses.
— The names and corresponding addresses are uniquely
defined. A name space maps each address to a unique
name. It can be arranged in two different ways :
1. Flat name space.
2. Hierarchical name space.
5.19.3 Flat Name Space :
~ Ina flat name space, a name is assigned to every
address. This type of name is simply the sequence of
characters. That means it does not have any structure.
The flat name space is not suitable for large systems
like Internet, because there can be ambiguity and /or
duplication,
§.19.4 Hierarchical Name Space :
In the hierarchical name space, each name is made of
‘any parts, The first part may correspond to the name
of an institution, the second part may define the
department and so on.
~The part that defines the nature of institution and name
Of institution is assigned by a central authority. The
responsibility of deciding the rest of the name can be
siven to that institute itself
~ That institute can add suffix or prefix to the name for
defining its host or resources.
5.37
6.20 Domain Name Space :
= concepuaty the ine
Wek has been ded
hundreds of top level domains, Each ons s 7
om cones
ach domain is eided
the ar rhe pate
= These domains can be 1
a represented by a tree as shown
erate 4b canta
Pom 9% mt om ot ip
un yale
«4h
cs ang
into several subd
oman
*d and so on, id
al tind,
1
robot
(G-630/Fig. 520.1: A portion of Internet domain name space
The top level domains are of two types namely generic
and countries.
Generic domains :
= The generic domains are com (commercial), edu
(educational institutions), gov (government), int (some
international organizations), mil (military, net (network
providers) and org (nonprofit organizations),
= The country domains include one entry for every
country,
= Each domain is named by following an upward path.
The components are separated by dots eg.
engssun.com. This is called hierarchical naming.
= Another example of hierarchical naming is shown in
Fig, 5.20.2. The upward followed path has been shown
by an arrow.
Reet
Labo! VA
Nn Le exman sana
Domain name
Se
Domain names labels and
Label + Reader
(G-sa)Flg. 5.20.
her
© Scanned with OKEN Scanner 5.38
ACN. /Sem. SMSBTE)
Labet
Each node in the tree has @ label (or component) and it
‘can be specified using upto 63 characters.
If we had to remember the IP addresses of all of the
Web sites we visit every day, we would all go nuts,
Human beings just are not that good at remembering
strings of numbers. We are good at remembering
words, however, and that is where domain names come
jn. You probably have hundreds of domain names
stored in your head. For example :
wwwyahoo.com - the world's best-known name
wwwmitedu - a popular EDU name
encarta.msn.com - a Web server that does not start with
‘Are domain names cat
How many characters ?
Appivauvcayer
nds with 3 dot (or
always e'
‘An absolute domain name a
period as it was called) For example &”9) sun.
fe domain does not end with @ dot.
But the rela
sensitive ?
ive. So com and COM means
No they are not case sensiti
the same thing.
Component names can have upto 63 characters and the
full path name can at the most have 255 characters
Each domain “controls how it allocates the domain
under it, To create a new domain we have to take a
permission of the domain in which itis to be included,
wonbbcco.uk - a name using four parts rather than | Domain
three ~ Adomain can be defined as a subtree of the DNS name
fepamicrosoft.com - an ETP server rather than a Web space as shown in Fig. 5.20.3. The name of the domain
server is the domain name of the node at the top of the
| eg. com or edu.
- The COM, EDU and UK portions of these domain names subtree as show 9.5 20. Sea c -
are called the top-level domain or first-level damain. | - A domain can be divided into subdomains as show
There are several hundred top-level domain names, Fig. 5.203.
including COM, EDU, GOV, F n 9
ining COM, EOU, GOV, ML NET ORG and 8. 5 | _ Neve gt the naming follows crganizatons!
try boundaries, not physical networks. That means even if
— Within every top-level domain there is a huge list of two different departments are located in the same
eee domains. For example, in the COM first- building, they can have distinct domains. But the
domain, you have got: computers belonging to the same department kept in
- yahoo two different buildings will not have different domains.
= msn Root
— microsoft
= plus millions of others.
~ Every name in the COM top-level domain must be .
lunique, but there can be duplication across domains. | 2! Domain
For example, msn.com and msn.org are completely
different machines. Porat
~ In the case of bbc.co.uk, itis a third-level domain. Up to
127 levels are possible, although more than four is rare.
~The left-most word, such as www or encarta, is the
hhost name. It specifies the name of a specific machine (G-633)Fig. 5.20.3 : Domains
(with a specific IP address) in a domain. A given domain 524
z Distribution of Name Space:
c2n potentially contain millions of host names as long
as they are all unique within that domain,
‘Absolute and relative domain names :
Domain names can be of two types : absolute or
relative,
——_
The information contained in the domain name should
be stored. But this is a huge informat "0
it on one computer then the
inefficient and unreliable,
tion and if we store
System would be highly
ee
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5.30
je will be an inefficient system because the systern wi
tbe heavily loaded by the requests coming from all over
the world.
twill be unreliable because fllure of one computer will
rake the data inaccessible. If we make a distibuted
name space then all these problems can be overcome,
21. Hierarchy of Name Servers :
ame server contains the DNS database ie. the various
ames and their corresponding IP addresses,
_ theoretically a single name server could contain the
entire DNS database. But practically to store such a
huge information at one, place is inefficient and
unreliable.
_ such a server will be soon overloaded and be useless
and worst thing is if it ever. goes down the entire
Internet will go down.
The solution to this problem Is to distribute the
information among many computers called DNS
servers. :
Then we have to use @ hierarchy of the Name servers as
shown in Fig. 5.21.1.
= Fist the whole space is divided into many first level
domains, The root server stands alone and can create as
many fist level domains as required.
= The first level domains are further divided into smaller
subdomains called second level domains. They can be
further divided as shown in Fig. 5.21.1.
Root server
(G-¢34Flg. 5.21.1 : Hlerarchy of name servers
~ Esch server can be responsible (authoritative) to either @
large or small domain,
ad that the hierarchy of servers is similar to the
Verarchy of names.
‘Application Le
The whol
whole DNS name space is divided up into non
overlapping zone:
ones. The conc
explained below. aR
Zones
‘With a number of ONS servers being used instead of a
single one, we have to define the area over which each
server has an authority
What a server is responsible for or has authority over is
called as a zone.
a server is appointed for a domain and the domain is
not further divided into subdomains then the domain
and zone will be the same as shown in Fig. 521.2.
The server makes a database called a zone file. It keeps
all information about every node under that zone.
But if a server divides its domains into subdomains and
delegates a part of its authority to other servers then
domain and zone will be different from each other. This
is shown in Fig. 521.2.
(G-638)Fig. 5.21.2: Domains and zones
The information about the nodes that belong to the
subdomains is stored in the servers at the lower levels
‘The higher level and original server Keeps some sort of
reference of these lower level servers.
Root server:
_ root server is defined as a server whose zone consists
of the whole DNS tree. It does not store any
information about domains but delegates the authori
to other servers It only keeps the reference of these
servers.
_ There are more than 13 root servers and they are
distributed all around the world.
—
rc
© Scanned with OKEN Scanner WW AGN (Comp. Sem. SIMSBTE)
Primary and secondary servers
DNS defines two types of servers namely the primary
servers and te secondary sewers.
Primary server:
Its a server which stores a file about its zone. It
authorised to create, maintain and update the zone fie. I
stores the zone file on a local disk.
‘Secondary server :
— This server transfers complete information about a zone
from another server which may be primary or secondary
server. The transferred information is saved on the disc
storage of the secondary server.
=, The secondary server is not authorized to create or
update a zone file. If its zone file is to be updated, then
it is to be done by the primary server.
5.22 _DNS in the Internet
Let us now understand how DNS is used in Internet
where the domain name space (tree) is divided into three
different sections as shown in Fig. 5.22.1.
1. Generic domain 2. Country domain
3. _ Inverse domain,
oot
(6-636)Fig. 5.22.1 : Use of DNS in Internet
5.22.1 Generic Domains
~The registered hosts are defined in the géneric domains
according to their generic behaviour eg. com for
commercial organizations. The first level in the generic
domains section allows 14 possible lablés. Some of
them are given in Table 5.22.1.
Table 5.22.1 : Generic domain lables
stable}: Description: —
Airline or aerospace related companies.
aero
com
coop.
Commercial organizations.
Cooperative business organizations.
5-40
=o 9
[gov | Governmentinsiutons
int _| International organizations.
mil_| Military organization.
net _| Network support centers.
‘org _| Non-profit organizations.
5.22.2 Country Dom
= This domain section uses two character country
abbreviations eg. US for united states.
second lable in this domain can specify organization or
national designations.
5.22.3 Inverse Domain :
‘The inverse domain is used for mapping an address toa
name. This is exactly the opposite process discussed so far in
which a name is mapped onto the address.
5.23 Name Address Resolution
The process of mapping a name to an address or vice
versa is called as name address resolution.
Resolver :
= DNSapplication is based on the client server model. Ifa
host wants to map a name to addréss or vice versa it
calls a DNS client named as resolver.
— In other words, when the name <> address mapping is
necessary a host calls a resolver.
~The resolver then sends a mapping request to the
closest DNS server and accesses its storage,
~ lf this server has the requested information, it gives that
information to the resolver but if it does not have the
requested information, then it refers the resolver to
other servers or asks other servers to provide the
information,
~ Thus the resolver receives the mapping from some
source. It then checks for errors and if found error free
delivers the mapping to the requesting process.
Mapping names to addresses :
Generally the resolver gives a domain name to the
Server and requests for the corresponding IP address
We ramones
© Scanned with OKEN Scanner pecs te genetic OF County domains tg
se sponding a08Fe-
in nae strom the genic domain section
ver receives @ domain name such as,
KY: zz.edu
ws sent tothe Local DNS server for resolution
ie
server does not get the answer then it wil
i ease ter seve OF asks them directly.
rove pvccoue 6 fovowed fOr 8 name from
domain.
cient sends an IP address to 2 server and
forts name, Ths type of query called as PTR
wy
so wrner the PTR query, the DNS uses the inverse
ont.
ie ares is 242. 3648.126 then the rescher first
the address and adds two labels “in add” and
+ oft So the domain name sent is:
118.48.36.142in_addrarpa
“isis eceived by the local DNS and resolved.
4 Recursive Resolution :
= sometimes a client (resolver) requests for recursive OF
final answer from a name server.
11s server is authorised for the domain name, it
"checsits database and sends a reply.
= tif this server isnot authorised ft diverts this reavest
te another server (usually the parent server) and walls
forthe response,
The parent has the authority, then it sends the answer,
Stecvce it dverts the query to another ever
nse is returned back
When the query is solved, the resPo'
"the requesting client.
Sh a query is called as recusve aueny and
Presi called recursive resolution. I is Hustated I"
Fa.s232
(6-637) Fg, 5.23.1: Recursive resolution
5.23.2 Iterative Resolution :
This type of ma
Ping can be done if the.
ask for recursive answer, are
Initerats
ative resolution ifthe sere as authority forthe
name it wll send the answer. But ft doesnot have the
authority then it returns to the client the IP address of
the server that holds the answer tothe query.
= The client has to repeat the query to this new server. if
this server also cannot answer the query then it sends
the IP address of another server to the lent.
= Now the client should send the query to this thire
server, This process is called 5 Reratve resolution
because client sends the same query to different
servers -
= Fig. 5.232 illustrates the iterative resolution.
[oe
eso. 523.2: ative reson
DNS examples =
the DNS system sa database, ond 0 OMe database
on the planet gets this many requests No ber saarson
at has milfns of people chagied © every day
the plant te
tr That i what makes te ONS system so unigu
For example =
vyahoocorn the words best-known name
vmiveas-apepuer DUTT at ih
sramancom - 8 Web s2”5! that
ceca
Si sas rather than three
sve. bde.couk =
¥ yechtaalede
© Scanned with OKEN Scanner 8 cn (Comp. ‘Sem. SMSBTE)
{ftp microsoft.com - an FTP server rather than a Web server
wwwspee.acin - Server in India ‘in’ domain.
‘The COM, EDU and UK portions of these domain names
are called the top-level domain or first-level domain.
There are several hundred top-level domain names,
including COM, EDU, GOV, MIL, NET, ORG and INT, as
well as unique two-letter combinations for every
country.
5.23.3 The DNS Message Format
DNS has two types of messages as follows and both of
‘them have the same format
1. Query 2. Responses or reply
= The formats of the two DNS messages are as shown in
Fig. 5233.
“aoa
informton sneton
(b) Response or reply
(6-639)Fig. 5.23.3
(2) Query
- Both query and reply messages have the same header
“format with some fields set to zero for query messages.
The header is 12 byte long. The header format for both
the types of messages is shown by shaded portions in
Fig. 5.23.3.
5.23.4 Caching :
~ Every time 2 query is asked, the server has to spend
time in searching the corresponding IP address,
If this searching time is reduced then efficiency would
90 up. The searching time can be reduced by using a
technique called caching.
~ When a server asks for a mapping from another server
and receives the response, it stores this information in
its cache memory before sending it to the client,
Hf the same or other client request for the same
mapping, it can check its cache memory and resolve the
Problem at its own level. This will certainly save a lot of
time.
5.42
gis that, if @ server caches
problem with ae ong time then the mapping
sppINg el the client will not Get the latest
ied and the
tn cachin:
- Butt
(stores) @ me
may get outdat
mapping:
This problem
