DNS setup with external servers (dnsonly)

[sp3ctre69]

I have had a look online and found some information on DNS setup, but so far I can't find exactly what I am after and I am still in a bit of a muddle, so please excuse the simplistic questions.

What I am doing is setting up two separate DNS servers running DNS ONLY, but I am a bit confused about how to setup the name servers DNS entries.

I currently only have one WHM server but I am looking to expand this year, hence the two DNS servers being separate.

previously I had NS.MYSERVER.NET and NS1.MYSERVER.NET on the WHM box but have added NS2 and NS3 to be the DNS servers.

I have added A-records for NS2 and NS3 to the MYSERVER.NET zone and have added NS records to the zone also (did I need to do that?).

Other than that I have setup the DNS cluster to sync to NS2 and NS3 and that is working fine.

The MYSERVER.NET nameserver records specify NS0, NS1, NS2 and NS3, along with their individual IP's. I have also set reverse DNS correctly on the external DNS servers.

Is there anything I am missing (other than securing the DNS servers, I will tackle that as a separate issue)? I am a little unclear as to how much info about the external DNS servers needs to be in the MYSERVER.NET zone.

Any help would be much appreciated... sorry again if these are dumb questions, I hope to learn fast

Jim

 

[cPanelTristan]

You were right to put the NS entries into the zone file along with the A records for the nameservers and what you have stated so far appears correct.

Next, did you have any specific questions on the clustering setup itself?

 

[sp3ctre69]

Thanks Tristan,

That's good, it is all starting to make sense. What I would say about the clustering is the wording on cPanel seems a bit confusing (i.e. referring to "this server"... is that the server we are on or the server in the list?). Anyway, I added the IP's of my two DNS servers and changed them to "sync" mode. I left the settings on the other servers unchanged (apart from clustering is enabled). Is this correct? It seems to be working.

The diagram looks correct in that it shows two lines coming out of the webserver (with arrows) pointing to my two DNS servers. I don't see the same picture on the DNS servers though, just a "broken box" type image.

So to clarify, for a nameserver to be a nameserver it doesn't need to have a specific entry in DNS other than the A record, right?

Thanks for the help so far, I "think" it's making sense

 

[sp3ctre69]

I have thought of another question....

This is how I understand it, I would just like some clarification...

Currently the SOA record for my domains is NS.MYSERVER.NET. When I migrate the domain to a new server this will change to NS.MYNEWSERVER.NET, right?

 

[cPanelTristan]

For clustering, the web server(s) would sync to the DNS only servers, while the DNS only servers will act as standalone for the web servers. Basically, you do the following:

Web server WHM > configure cluster > add nameservers, set role to synchronize changes for the nameservers
Nameservers > configure cluster > add web servers, set role to standalone for the web servers

For the nameservers to be nameservers, they need A records and they need to have the NS set for each zone created to show those nameservers. You configure the NS records simply be setting the nameservers in WHM > Basic cPanel & WHM Setup area.

I don't understand the last question. An SOA is the time and date for the zone with some other miscellaneous details. What part of the SOA are you talking about specifically?

 

[sp3ctre69]

Thanks, that makes sense now...

I think I was confused about the SOA, as the record seemed to have a nameserver referenced in it and I wasn't sure if that was important?

Looks like I have everything setup correct then, whether by luck or good management, who knows

I was told you should set a long timeout on the secondary DNS server, so it can cope with the primary being offline. Is this correct, and if so what is the correct way of setting this up?

Thanks