tinydns-edit(8)

📦 version 1.05, in debian bookworm, debian trixie, nixos 26.05, nixpkgs unstable, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble, ubuntu questing, ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💖 tinydns-edit — the manual, bestie edition (section 8, System Manager's Manual) 🎀

okay so you found tinydns-edit(8) and you're like "what is this" — let me hold your hand through it, no cap.

✨ NAME ✨

tinydns-edit — edits the (source form of the) database that gets served by tinydns/axfrdns. that's the whole job. she's a niche icon and we love her for it. 💅

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

tinydns-edit data data.tmp add type name address

like, that's the shape of it. four-ish things after the command, all of them mandatory, all of them doing something. let's go. 🦋

💜 DESCRIPTION 💜

so tinydns-edit edits the data file — which is the source form of the database that gets compiled by tinydns-data(8) and then served by tinydns(8) and axfrdns(8). she's not the database itself, she's the source of it. think of her as the Notes app before it becomes the presentation. 💖

the update to data is atomic, bestie. the way that works: first she writes the updated database content into the file data.tmp, and then she renames data.tmp to data. one clean swap, no half-finished mess. but — and this is the important bit — the two files must live on the same volume for that little rename trick to actually work. same volume or it's over. 🙈

on success, tinydns-edit returns zero. if, for any reason, an error occurs, she exits with a non-zero code and data will not be changed. your file is safe, she's very careful. 🫶

with the "add" verb, tinydns-edit appends a record to the database. its type is decided by type, its fully-qualified name is name, and its IP address is address. and type can be exactly one of these queens: 👑

  • ns — a '.' record gets created. this record says the domain name is published by a DNS content server that's listening on the IP address address.

the name of the DNS content server is not directly specifiable. names are automatically assigned by tinydns-edit herself, following the pattern [a-z].ns.name. she'll assign the first letter of the alphabet that isn't already used in another '.' or '&' record as the name of a DNS content server. and if no letters of the alphabet remain unused — yeah, tinydns-edit will fail. 💀

if a '.' or '&' record for the domain already exists, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the new record for the same length of time as they're allowed to cache the existing records. otherwise, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the record for up to 3 days. ⭐

  • childns — a '&' record gets created. this record says queries for names in the domain name should be referred to a ("child") DNS content server that's listening on the IP address address.

the name of the DNS content server is not directly specifiable. names are automatically assigned by tinydns-edit herself, following the pattern [a-z].ns.name. she'll assign the first letter of the alphabet that isn't already used in another '.' or '&' record as the name of a DNS content server. if no letters of the alphabet remain unused, tinydns-edit will fail. 😭

if a '.' or '&' record for the domain already exists, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the new record for the same length of time as they're allowed to cache the existing records. otherwise, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the record for up to 3 days. ✨

  • mx — a '@' record gets created. this record says mail to names in the domain name should be sent to an SMTP server that's listening on the IP address address.

the name of the SMTP server is not directly specifiable. names are automatically assigned by tinydns-edit herself, following the pattern [a-z].mx.name. she'll assign the first letter of the alphabet that isn't already used in another '@' record as the name of an SMTP server. if no letters of the alphabet remain unused, tinydns-edit will fail. 🍓

it is not possible to specify the distance value for the SMTP server. tinydns-edit will leave that field blank, which means tinydns-data(8) will use whatever the default value is. not her problem, she's delegating. 💅

if a '@' record for the domain already exists, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the new record for the same length of time as they're allowed to cache the existing records. otherwise, proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache the record for up to 1 day. 🌸

  • host — a '=' record gets created, one that proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache for up to 1 day. this record says the name name maps to the IP address address and vice versa.

tinydns-edit will fail if a '=' record already exists that uses either name or address. she does not play about duplicates. 🚫

  • alias — a '+' record gets created, one that proxy DNS servers are allowed to cache for up to 1 day. this record says the name name maps to the IP address address but that there is no reverse mapping.

because this is an alias record, tinydns-edit will not fail if there happen to already be existing records that use address. different rules for the alias girlies. 🦋

🔥 SEE ALSO 🔥

iykyk. go read those next, bestie. 🌈

👑 AUTHOR AND MODIFICATIONS 👑

this manual page was created by Jonathan de Boyne Pollard on 2001-04-06. a legend, fr fr.

2001-04-26: a new AUTHOR AND MODIFICATIONS section was added. axfrdns(8) is now mentioned. the description of how server names were auto-generated was clarified. and a cut-and-paste error in the description of the "mx" type was corrected. we love a glow-up. 💖

and that's the whole page, babe. this one comes from the System Manager's Manual, filed under tinydns-edit(8), dated 2001-04-06 (with the lil update note from 2001-04-26). stay atomic, stay on the same volume, and go edit that database. periodt. 💅✨🎀

📦 where this page comes from