RFC 6303 and bind 9.9.0

Spain, Dr. Jeffry A. spainj at countryday.net
Thu Mar 1 01:19:20 UTC 2012


I reviewed RFC 6303, which recommends configuring a number of zones using an empty zone file as follows:

@ 10800 IN SOA @ nobody.invalid. 1 3600 1200 604800 10800
@ 10800 IN NS @

In bind 9.9.0 this results in errors for each zone referring to the empty zone file as follows:
Feb 29 19:24:30 ns0s named[6044]: zone 10.in-addr.arpa/IN: NS '10.in-addr.arpa' has no address records (A or AAAA)
Feb 29 19:24:30 ns0s named[6044]: zone 10.in-addr.arpa/IN: not loaded due to errors.

Changing the second line to '@ 10800 IN NS localhost.' eliminates the errors.

This question was raised several weeks ago (see https://lists.isc.org/pipermail/bind-users/2012-January/086321.html), but no explanation was offered as to why '@ 10800 IN NS @' causes these errors. What additional thoughts does anyone have?

Another question with regard to RFC 6303: 255.255.255.255.in-addr.arpa is recommended for an empty zone. RFC 1912, on the contrary, and stipulating to the fact that this document is 15 years old, recommends 255.in-addr.arpa. Going with the recommendations in RFC 6303 results in 'dig @localhost -x 225.x.y.z' sending a query out to the Internet for any 255.x.y.x other than 255.255.255.255. Which of these alternative empty zones should be used in the current DNS environment and why?

Thanks. Jeff.

Jeffry A. Spain
Network Administrator
Cincinnati Country Day School




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