DNS Configuration

Virtualmin
1

Hi,

I’ve got my DNS set up and apparently working for both my main domain and some additional ones, but intoDNS reports various errors:

FAIL: The following nameservers are listed at your nameservers as nameservers for your domain, but are not listed at the parent nameservers (see RFC2181 5.4.1). You need to make sure that these nameservers are working.If they are not working ok, you may have problems!
server1.swansoftware.co.uk

ERROR: One or more of the nameservers listed at the parent servers are not listed as NS records at your nameservers. The problem NS records are:
ns1.swansoftware.co.uk
ns2.swansoftware.co.uk
This is listed as an ERROR because there are some cases where nasty problems can occur (if the TTLs vary from the NS records at the root servers and the NS records point to your own domain, for example).

Stealth NS records were sent:
server1.swansoftware.co.uk

(From http://www.intodns.com/swansoftware.co.uk)

How would I go about fixing these problems?

Thanks,

2

What you’re seeing wouldn’t typically cause problems, it’s just an ugly warning. However, it doesn’t hurt to correct it :slight_smile:

Here is the issue –

By default in your DNS, Virtualmin sets up one ‘NS’ record – it uses
your system’s hostname for this.

What intodns.com is seeing is that your systems hostname isn’t the same
as the nameservers being used for that domain.

To fix that, what you can do is:

Then, repeat the above for all your Virtual Servers.

To fix this for new Virtual Servers –

  • Go into System Settings -> Server Templates -> Default -> BIND DNS Domain

  • Change “Master DNS server hostname” to be ns1.swansoftware.co.uk

  • Add ns2.swansoftware.co.uk to “Additional manually configured nameservers”

Once you save all that, any new Virtual Servers you get will use ns1 and
ns2 for it’s NS records.

3

Ahh, great, thankyou.

I have already added two A records (ns1 & ns2.swansoftware.co.uk) as per the instructions in the DNS FAQ; is it okay to leave those as they are with the above changes?

Edit: I’m also getting the following error when trying to change the nameservers for another .com I own: “Error text: Nameserver ns1.swansoftware.co.uk doesn’t exists in the registry” – I’ve had no such problems for the other .co.uk s. Is this just a caching problem, or something more seriously wrong?

Thanks,

4

Yeah, I’d keep the two ‘A’ records. You need both, the ‘A’ and the ‘NS’ records.

Now that you mention it, the FAQ probably ought to be updated to cover adding the two NS records.

As far as the error “Nameserver ns1.swansoftware.co.uk doesn’t exists in the registry” – where are you seeing that exactly?

That makes it sound like that particular nameserver wasn’t registered as a nameserver at your domain name registrar, but you appear to be using those as nameservers for some domains already – which implies it was registered :slight_smile:

-Eric

5

Added the NS records, and all those errors seem to have vanished: thanks!

I’m getting the later error from my domain registrar (123reg) when I try and change the nameservers in the control panel.

I definitely registered the nameservers with them (as evidenced by them working for all the .co.uk domains); is it likely this is a problem with their systems or with my configuration?

Thanks again,

6

It sounds like they aren’t seeing that you have those registered as nameservers. If you’ve registered them (which appears to be the case), the next step would be to contact their support and ask about that message. It, in theory, shouldn’t be related to anything on your server.

-Eric

7

I tried re-registering the nameservers (just in case), but it didn’t help. Emailed the registrar, who manually added the nameservers to their registry. Why they hadn’t gone in properly, I have no idea.

Thanks for all the help today; it’s much appreciated.