DNS forwarding: does it actually work?

[Robert Abbate]

I appreciate all the help received on this issue.
Before I try to setup a slave again, can anyone tell
me what this is for, and if anyone actually uses it in
their config?:

options {
      ....
        forward first;
        forwarders {
                12.34.56.78;
                };
        };
     ....
}