Since upgrading to 8.3.3, we have been experiencing problems with our two 
corporate nameservers resolving certain hosts.  The only hosts reported 
have been those in the yahoo.com domain which are cnames to akamai.

For example, I saw the following while debugging the problem today.  There 
was a host that returned the following error no matter how many times I 
tried to look it up.

  [nickh@lorien nickh]$ dig @ops click.shopping.yahoo.com

  ; <<>> DiG 9.2.0 <<>> @ops click.shopping.yahoo.com
  ;; global options:  printcmd
  ;; connection timed out; no servers could be reached

I dumped the database on backup and checked for shopping in the dump file:

  [nickh@ops named]$ sudo kill -INT `cat /var/run/named.pid `
  [nickh@ops named]$ grep shopping /var/named/named_dump.db
  [nickh@ops named]$

Nothing there.  Then I looked for the CNAME record specifically:

  [nickh@lorien nickh]$ dig @ops click.shopping.yahoo.com cname

  ; <<>> DiG 9.2.0 <<>> @ops click.shopping.yahoo.com cname
  ;; global options:  printcmd
  ;; Got answer:
  ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 38500
  ;; flags: qr aa rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 5, ADDITIONAL: 5

  ;; QUESTION SECTION:
  ;click.shopping.yahoo.com.      IN      CNAME

  ;; ANSWER SECTION:
  click.shopping.yahoo.com. 1800  IN      CNAME     click.shopping.yahoo.akadns.net.

  ;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
  yahoo.com.              168024  IN      NS      ns1.yahoo.com.
  yahoo.com.              168024  IN      NS      ns2.yahoo.com.
  yahoo.com.              168024  IN      NS      ns3.yahoo.com.
  yahoo.com.              168024  IN      NS      ns4.yahoo.com.
  yahoo.com.              168024  IN      NS      ns5.yahoo.com.

  ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
  ns1.yahoo.com.          168144  IN      A       66.218.71.63
  ns2.yahoo.com.          168024  IN      A       209.132.1.28
  ns3.yahoo.com.          168024  IN      A       217.12.4.104
  ns4.yahoo.com.          168024  IN      A       63.250.206.138
  ns5.yahoo.com.          168024  IN      A       64.58.77.85

  ;; Query time: 23 msec
  ;; SERVER: 10.0.0.2#53(ops)
  ;; WHEN: Tue Jul 16 15:44:51 2002
  ;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 281

Tried the db dump again, this time the record was there:

  [nickh@ops named]$ grep shopping /var/named/named_dump.db
  $ORIGIN shopping.yahoo.com.
  click   1795    IN      CNAME   click.shopping.yahoo.akadns.net.        ;Cr=auth [66.218.71.63]

Also, queries immediately started working:

  [nickh@lorien nickh]$ dig @ops click.shopping.yahoo.com

  ; <<>> DiG 9.2.0 <<>> @ops click.shopping.yahoo.com
  ;; global options:  printcmd
  ;; Got answer:
  ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 46741
  ;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 2, AUTHORITY: 10, ADDITIONAL: 10

  ;; QUESTION SECTION:
  ;click.shopping.yahoo.com.      IN      A

  ;; ANSWER SECTION:
  click.shopping.yahoo.com. 1783  IN      CNAME     click.shopping.yahoo.akadns.net.
  click.shopping.yahoo.akadns.net. 300 IN A       66.218.75.129

  ;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      NS1-159.AKAM.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      NS1-93.AKAM.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      USE2.AKAM.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZA.akadns.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZC.akadns.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZD.akadns.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZE.akadns.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZF.akadns.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZG.akadns.net.
  akadns.net.             168078  IN      NS      ZH.akadns.net.

  ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
  NS1-159.AKAM.net.       55536   IN      A       193.108.91.159
  NS1-93.AKAM.net.        55624   IN      A       193.108.91.93
  USE2.AKAM.net.          55624   IN      A       63.209.170.136
  ZA.akadns.net.          55624   IN      A       216.32.65.105
  ZC.akadns.net.          55625   IN      A       63.241.199.50
  ZD.akadns.net.          55625   IN      A       206.132.160.36
  ZE.akadns.net.          55625   IN      A       12.47.217.11
  ZF.akadns.net.          55625   IN      A       63.215.198.79
  ZG.akadns.net.          55625   IN      A       204.248.36.131
  ZH.akadns.net.          55625   IN      A       63.208.48.42

  ;; Query time: 25 msec
  ;; SERVER: 10.0.0.2#53(ops)
  ;; WHEN: Tue Jul 16 15:45:08 2002
  ;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 473

Has anyone had this problem with 8.3.3?  My workaround for the moment, 
which is keeping all our Yahoo users happy, is to run a script that does 
repeated cname lookups on the problem host names.

--
For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public
relations, for nature cannot be fooled.