Does DA Support Round-Robin DNS?

[LetsFixItQuick]

I have DA installed on a dedi and VPS and I would like to make the VPS slave to the master, actually mirroring the master on the VPS. I don't want visitors to go to my sites and find them down so I want to create four NS, Round-Robin style like so:

NS1---->Master
NS2---->Slave
NS3---->Master
NS4---->Slave

I've created domain names specifically to use for NS since I have nearly 20 domain names spread across three servers. (The third won't be part of this setup.)

I've noticed, however, that DA only allows two NS to be added per record/server and instructions to add a third but when I tried to add two new NS rather than one, the entire NS for the master got all bollixed up.

Before I try this again, I'd like to know if DA even supports it and how.

Looking forward to your solutions!

Michelle P

 

[tillo]

I don't know about using 2 IPs for each machine (which is a great idea if one IP get nullrouted by your datacenter or if you have multiple NICs on different peers to spread the traffic) on DA, but I know that DA's nameserver synchronization is not a master/slave system: instead of using the builtin synchronization feature, it just executes the same command (add/remove records and zones) in each server of the cluster, making ALL of them master. In my opinion, this is way better: you will be able to modify any zone from any server, just as if you were on the "real" server for that domain.

If I were you and I had just 20 domains I wouldn't mess with DA to make the four address to be added automatically when creating a zone, but I'd set NS1 and NS2, then add manually NS3 and NS4 to each domain. That's what I do with freedns.afraid.org's Backup DNS service for my domains.
Sometimes it's better to stick with the default behaviour and do things by hand, to avoid problems with upgrades and restores.

 

[LetsFixItQuick]

Thank you but I've decided just to remove DA from all of my servers and find a product that (a) I can control my DNS configuration and (b) I control the logs and other configuration files on my servers.

Despite the fact that I have "just" 20 domain names, I have growth plans and I'm planning for that growth now, just as I've always done with structuring my business entities and activities, despite those, including "experts" like lawyers and accountants, who thought I didn't need to do whatever I was doing at the time. Guess who are coming to me for advice on how to structure their enterprises?

I've always been ahead of my time and this is no different. If this product isn't robust enough to do the more complex tasks that contemporary server admins know are necessary to preserve their data, their privacy and redundancy on their servers, than it isn't the right product for the job.

Sasha

 

[Michael.Terence]

ZOINKS!!

DA isn't the end all, be all - nor is it a replacement for a competent admin... its merely a tool that helps web hosts automate tasks that can be automated and delegates functionality to users where applicable.

DA (and other web hosting control panels) focus on the functionality that the majority of web hosts require and generally, they fill that need adequately.

 

[floyd]

Thank you but I've decided just to remove DA from all of my servers and find a product that (a) I can control my DNS configuration and (b) I control the logs and other configuration files on my servers.

DA does allow you to do this. You just have to spend more than 20 minutes learning how to use DA. The great thing about DA is that it does allow you to do pretty much anything you want. It is the other control panels that limit you.

 

[floyd]

I've noticed, however, that DA only allows two NS to be added per record/server and instructions to add a third but when I tried to add two new NS rather than one, the entire NS for the master got all bollixed up.

It only allows 2 to be used by default. You can easily add 100 after the domain has been added to the server. You can completely manage the DNS zone file from DA.