Ubuntu Manpage: pdnsd - dns proxy daemon

NAME

       pdnsd - dns proxy daemon

SYNOPSIS

       pdnsd [-h] [-V] [-s] [-d] [-g] [-t] [-p file] [-vn] [-mxx] [-c file] [-4] [-6] [-a]

       This  man  page  is  an  extract  of  the  documentation  of pdnsd.  For complete, current
       documentation, refer to the HTML (or plain text) documentation (which you can find in  the
       doc/  subdirectory  of  the  source  or  in  a standard documentation directory, typically
       /usr/share/doc/pdnsd/ if you are using a binary package).

DESCRIPTION

       pdnsd is a IPv6 capable proxy domain name server (DNS) which saves the contents of its DNS
       cache to the disk on exit.

OPTIONS

-4 enables IPv4 support. IPv6 support is automatically disabled (should it be
available). On by default.

-6 enables IPv6 support. IPv4 support is automatically disabled (should it be
available). Off by default.

-a With this option, pdnsd will try to detect automatically if the system
supports IPv6, and fall back to IPv4 otherwise.

-V or --version
Print version information and exit.

-c FILE or --config-file=FILE
specifies that configuration is to be read from FILE. Default is
/etc/pdnsd.conf.

-d or --daemon
Start pdnsd in daemon mode (as a background process).

-g or --debug
Print some debug messages on the console or to the file pdnsd.debug in your
cache directory (in daemon mode).

-h or --help
Print an option summary and exit.

-i PREFIX or --ipv4_6_prefix=PREFIX
specifies the prefix pdnsd uses (when running in IPv6 mode) to map IPv4
addresses in the configuration file to IPv6 addresses. Must be a valid IPv6
address. Default is ::ffff:0.0.0.0

-p FILE
writes the pid the server runs as to the specified filename. Works only in
daemon mode.

--pdnsd-user
Print the user pdnsd will run as and exit.

-s or --status
enables the status control socket. Either this option should be passed to
the command line or status_ctl=on; should be specified in the config file if
you want to use pdnsd-ctl(8) to control pdnsd at runtime.

-t or --tcp
enables the TCP server thread. pdnsd will then serve TCP and UDP queries.

-vn sets the verbosity of pdnsd. n is a numeric argument between 0 (normal
operation) to 3 (many messages for debugging).

-mxx sets the query method pdnsd uses. Possible values for xx are:

uo - pdnsd will use UDP only. This is the fastest method, and should be
supported by all name servers on the Internet.

to - pdnsd will use TCP only. TCP queries usually take more time than UDP
queries, but are more secure against certain attacks, where an attacker
tries to guess your query id and to send forged answers. TCP queries are not
supported by some name servers.

tu - pdnsd will try to use TCP, and will fall back to UDP if its connection
is refused or times out.

ut - pdnsd will try to use UDP, and will repeat the query using TCP if the
UDP reply was truncated (i.e. the tc bit is set). This is the behaviour
recommended by the DNS standards.

Additionally, "no" can be prepended to the --status, --daemon, --debug and --tcp
options (e.g. --notcp) to reverse their effect.

USAGE

pdnsd is usually run from a startup script. For pdnsd to work, You need to:-

1. Tell your system to use pdnsd as the primary DNS server by modifying
/etc/resolv.conf.

2. Tell pdnsd to use an authentic source for DNS records, by including the IP
addresses of one or more DNS servers, usually your ISP's DNS servers, in
/etc/pdnsd.conf.

For this, put the following line in your /etc/resolv.conf

nameserver 127.0.0.X

where X can be any number. (I use 3). Comment out all other entries. You should put the
same value in the server_ip= line in global section of /etc/pdnsd.conf.
If you want to use pdnsd as the DNS server for a small local network, you should use the
IP address or name of the interface connected to this network instead of 127.0.0.X.

To tell pdnsd where to get DNS information from, add the following lines in
/etc/pdnsd.conf:-

server {
label= "myisp";
ip=123.456.789.001,123.456.789.002;
proxy_only=on;
timeout=10;
}

Note the opening and closing braces. Add more such server sections for each set of DNS
servers you want pdnsd to query. Of course the configuration options shown here are just
examples. More examples can be found in /etc/pdnsd.conf.sample or the pdnsd.conf in the
documentation directory. See the pdnsd.conf(5) man page for all the possible options and
their exact meaning.

If you use a dial up connection, remember that ppp scripts usually replace
/etc/resolv.conf when connection with the ISP is established. You need to configure ppp
(or whatever you use to establish a connection) so that /etc/resolv.conf is not replaced
every time a connection is established. Read the documentation for the scripts run when
your network comes up.

If you use pppconfig, specify `none' in the `nameservers' option in the `advanced' tab.
If you use multiple ISPs, you should do this for each connection/account.

If you use multiple ISPs, you should tell pdnsd which DNS servers have become available by
calling pdnsd-ctl, the pdnsd control utility, in a script (e.g. /etc/ppp/ip-up when you
use pppd) that is run when the connection is established. If the addresses of the DNS
servers are obtained through some type of dynamic configuration protocol (e.g. pppd with
the usepeerdns option or a DHCP client), you can pass the DNS server addresses as an extra
argument to pdnsd-ctl to configure pdnsd at run time. See the pdnsd-ctl(8) man page for
details.

FILES

       /etc/pdnsd.conf  is  the  pdnsd  configuration  file.   The  file format and configuration
       options are described in the pdnsd.conf(5) man page. You can find examples of  almost  all
       options in /etc/pdnsd.conf.sample.

       /var/cache/pdnsd/pdnsd.cache

       /var/cache/pdnsd/pdnsd.status  is  the status control socket, which must be enabled before
       you can use pdnsd-ctl.

       /etc/init.d/pdnsd (the name and location of the start-up script may be different depending
       on your distribution.)

       /etc/resolv.conf

       /etc/defaults/pdnsd contains additional parameters or options which may be passed to pdnsd
       at boot time. This saves the hassle of fiddling with initscripts  (not  available  on  all
       distributions).

BUGS

       The  verbosity  option  -vn  presently  does not seem to have much effect on the amount of
       debug output.
       Report any remaining bugs to the authors.

CONFORMING TO

       pdnsd should comply with RFCs 1034 and 1035. As of version 1.0.0, RFC compliance has  been
       improved  and pdnsd is now believed (or hoped?)  to be fully RFC compatible. It completely
       follows RFC 2181 (except for one minor issue in the FreeBSD port, see the documentation).

       It  does  NOT  support  the  following  features,  of  which  most  are  marked  optional,
       experimental or obsolete in these RFCs:

              • Inverse queries

              • Status queries

              • Completion queries

              • Namespaces other than IN (Internet)

              •  AXFR  and  IXFR  queries  (whole  zone transfers); since pdnsd does not maintain
              zones, that should not violate the standard

       The following record types,  that  are  extensions  to  the  original  DNS  standard,  are
       supported  if  given as options at compile time. (if you do not need them, you do not need
       to compile support for them into pdnsd and save cache and executable space):

              • RP (responsible person, RFC 1183)

              • AFSDB (AFS database location, RFC 1183)

              • X25 (X25 address, RFC 1183)

              • ISDN (ISDN number/address, RFC 1183)

              • RT (route through, RFC 1183)

              • NSAP (Network Service Access Protocol address , RFC 1348)

              • PX (X.400/RFC822 mapping information, RFC 1995)

              • GPOS (geographic position, deprecated)

              • AAAA (IPv6 address, RFC 1886)

              • LOC (location, RFC 1876)

              • EID (Nimrod EID)

              • NIMLOC (Nimrod locator)

              • SRV (service record, RFC 2782)

              • ATMA (ATM address)

              • NAPTR (URI mapping, RFC 2168)

              • KX (key exchange, RFC 2230)

AUTHORS

       pdnsd  was  originally written by Thomas Moestl, <tmoestl@gmx.net>, ⟨⟩ and was extensively
       revised by Paul A.  Rombouts  <p.a.rombouts@home.nl>  ⟨⟩  (for  versions  1.1.8b1-par  and
       later).

       Several others have contributed to pdnsd; see files in the source or /usr/share/doc/pdnsd/
       directory.

       This man page was written by Mahesh T. Pai <paivakil@yahoo.co.in> ⟨⟩ using  the  documents
       in  /usr/share/docs/pdnsd/  directory  for  Debian, but can be used on other distributions
       too.

       Last revised: 22 Jul 2007 by Paul A. Rombouts.

COPYRIGHT

       This man page is a part of the pdnsd package,  and  may  be  distributed  in  original  or
       modified  form  under  terms  of  the GNU General Public License, as published by the Free
       Software Foundation; either version 3, or (at your option) any later version.

       You can find  a  copy  of  the  GNU  GPL  in  the  file  COPYING  in  the  source  or  the
       /usr/share/common-licenses/ directory if you are using a Debian system.