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what is DNS? Why it is used?What is "forward lookup" and "reverse lookup" in DNS? What are A records and mx records?

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Question added by Mohamed Aliyar Mohamed Ziyam , Computing Lecturer, Database Admin , Al Haqqaniyyah Arabic College.
Date Posted: 2013/09/22
Muhammad Tahir Masood
by Muhammad Tahir Masood , IT Project Manager (Infrastructure Support and IS Security) , Solution Founder Technology Company

1-DNS is Domain Name System.

 

2-The main task of DNS is to  resolve name to ip and ip to name. If we type www.google.com you will find the google page  but you don't know the ip address of google server its http://74.125.228.110/ so when you type this in your browser you can find the same home page. So this one is the main task of DNS its resolve name to ip and ip to name.

 

Forward and reverse lookup is the process of translating between (your local host ip address like you gave static ip172.21.20.10 ) ip address and  internet Domain or Computer name. 

 

let me make simple for you if you are a beginner

 

Forward Lookup:   name to IP

Reverse Lookup: IP to name 

 

For beginners this the best thing to understand.

 

A. record again i will tell you in simple words. A record is a host name to a static ip or  fully logical domain name.

 

Need simple answer about MX?

 

its a mail exchange record. Use for email registration you have to register your mac from different service provider. The set of MX record of a domain specifies how email should be routed with the simple mail transfer protocol SMTP.

 

ok in last go to your command prompt and type nslookup you will find some thing like

Default server:----

Address:--

now type google.com you can find all google ip address 

and you can do same thing bye typing one of the google's ip like192..

you will find result google.com so your forward and reverse both are working it will help you to understand DNS .

 

video will help you more:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBi8GCxk7NQ 

 

Many Thanks. Muhammad Tahir

 

Ehab shana
by Ehab shana , System Engineer , Vodafone International Services

DNS is the service that used to resolve Host Names to Ip address and vice versa, and contain the forward lookup zones that responsable about the main function of dns service as it have A record, SRV,SOA,NS,MX and Cname record , also contain reverse lookup zons the responsable for resolve IP to host name by creating PTR record on it, A record is responsable for main function for DNS as it resolve host name to IP address ,MX record used for mail service 

abdalrahman mohmmad
by abdalrahman mohmmad , IT Engineer , mixfm

Convert IP numbers to names and also can convert Reverse looking for the name of a computer by name and converts it to IP

Rami kamal Eldin Sharfi
by Rami kamal Eldin Sharfi , System Engineer , MTN (Mobile Telecommunication Company)

DNS : Domain Name system

its a serves used to translate the IP to Domin name  this step called Forward lookup , the reverse lookup is to translate the domain name to IP 

The Record is the table that save every IP with  its domain name 

Syed Asgar Mahmood Zaidi
by Syed Asgar Mahmood Zaidi , Senior System Engineer , Royal Hospital

DNS is a Microsoft Database Server it store information about Server, Services etc the mail purpose of DNS is for hostname resolving means when you give the hostname ip tells you about the ip address.

 

suppos you have a Internet connection and you hit http://www.gmail.com  so your machine need to resolve the address of  www A record in gmail.com  DNS Server.

 

Forward lookup Zone: is used to Resole Hostname to IP address

 

Reverse Lookup Zone: is used to Resolve visa virsa means from IP address to Hostname.

 

A Record is used to tell the Ip addrses of the Host.

 

MX Record Tells you the Exchange Server IP address.

 

 

Khandakar Ashfaqur Rahman
by Khandakar Ashfaqur Rahman , Head Of Network , Smart Network Ltd

DNS stands for DOmain Name system.It resolved name to IP and reversly IP to name.

Example: When you ping www.yahoo.com then it resolved to it's IP address 87.248.122.122.

 

Forward Zone is responsible for resolving Name to IP that is forward lookup

Example:

 

Default Server:  b.resolvers.Level3.net

Address:  4.2.2.2

> yahoo.com

Server:  b.resolvers.Level3.net

Address:  4.2.2.2

 

Non-authoritative answer:

Name:    yahoo.com

Addresses:  206.190.36.45

         98.138.253.109

         98.139.183.24

 

 

Reverse Zone is responsible to resolve IP to Name that is reverse lookup.

 

C:\Users\sysad>nslookup

Default Server:  b.resolvers.Level3.net

Address:  4.2.2.2

 

> set type=PTR

>98.138.253.109

Server:  b.resolvers.Level3.net

Address:  4.2.2.2

 

Non-authoritative answer:

109.253.138.98.in-addr.arpa     name = ir1.fp.vip.ne1.yahoo.com

 

 

Into Forward Zone you can put different  types of record like A,NS,SOA,MX,CNAME,WWW etc.

 

Into Reverse Zone usually you put PTR record.

 

 

A record id just a host record that indicates a host's IP address.You hsould put A record into Forward Zone file

 

MX record stands Mail Exchanger that uses for  Mail Server.It means by MX record you indocate your Mail Server.

 

 

 

Here is a sample Forward Zone File record:

 

$TTL    86400@      

IN      SOA     centos1.skau.net root.skau.net.  (            

                           ;  Serial                                   

                           28800      ; Refresh                                    

                         14400      ; Retry                                    

                         3600000    ; Expire                                     

                         86400 )    ; Minimum       

IN      NS      centos1.skau.net.       

IN      NS      centos2.skau.net.

centos1        A    192.168.37.91

centos2        A    192.168.37.92

centos3        A    192.168.37.93

 

 

Here is a sample Reverse Zone record

 

$TTL    86400@      

IN      SOA     centos1.skau.net root.skau.net.  (   

                          ; Serial                                   

                             28800      ; Refresh                                    

                             14400      ; Retry                                     

                         3600000    ; Expire                                   

                             86400 )    ; Minimum         

IN      NS      centos1.skau.net.         

IN      NS      centos2.skau.net.

91    IN    PTR    centos1.skau.net.

92    IN    PTR    centos2.skau.net.

93    IN    PTR    centos3.skau.net.

Ahmad Abdelrahman
by Ahmad Abdelrahman , Senior IT Support Specialist , Knowledge Point - EAI Group

excellent and comprehensive answer by Ehab Shana

Mohammad Elwasefy Elsayed
by Mohammad Elwasefy Elsayed , Senior IT Network and Security Engineer , Comlogic-SCC-ITconsultancy

It is the Brain of the Network "Domain name system"

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