To Outsource , or Not to Outsource....

Nathan Jones nathanj at optimo.com.au
Mon Mar 11 21:56:07 UTC 2002


On Mon, Mar 11, 2002 at 08:27:42AM -0800, Michael Martin wrote:
>The suits in my company want to do away with our master DNS server,
>and have our ISP maintain the Primary/Master (ie.. our zone files)

What is their reason for doing so? The cost of maintaining a DNS
server should be minimal if you have permanent connectivity anyway.
Otherwise, it may be best to outsource.

The main disadvantage I see, is that you may not have the same levels
of flexibility and control. Say you wanted to plan a network cutover
and couldn't wait a day for DNS changes to propagate... Would the ISP
allow you to lower the TTLs in advance?

Also, how reliable the ISP is would depend not only on their
experience, but on the complexity of your zones. If you have many
records and subdomains, there is a higher probability of human error
when they make changes for you.

If your management is concerned about the reliability of the inhouse
service, explain that the setup will cope with a bit of downtime,
since your primary server is not answering general queries.

-- 
Nathan Jones
nathanj at optimo.com.au


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