Domain Name System

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Domain Name System

A hierarchical system for identifying hosts on the Internet or on a private corporate TCP/IP internetwork. The Domain Name System (DNS) provides: A method for identifying hosts with friendly names instead of IP addresses. A distributed mechanism for storing and maintaining lists of names and IP addresses of hosts. A method for locating hosts by resolving their names into their associated IP addresses so that network communication can be initiated with the host.

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How DNS Works

The DNS namespace is hierarchical in structure, beginning with the root domain, which branches to top-level domains, then the second-level domains, and so on to the individual hostnames. For example, the fully-qualified domain name (FQDN) barney.northwind.microsoft.com can be broken down as follows:

barney . northwind . microsoft . com

host name third-level domain second-level top-level domain domain

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How DNS Works

In the FQDN, the root domain has a null label and is not expressed, as can be analyzed in the figure below:

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How DNS Works

A local network DNS root servers example.com DNS servers

What is www.example.com? (iterative) www.example.com is 3.4.5.6 What is Go ask the www.example.com? .com servers (recursive) (referral) What is www.example.com? (iterative)
I dunno: not in my cache or zone files Go ask the example.com servers (referral)
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www.example.com is 3.4.5.6 What is www.example.com? (iterative)

.com top-level servers

Domain Name System

The DNS is implemented as a distributed database using name servers located at various points on the Internet. Clients called resolvers can perform lookups by contacting name servers, which resolve host names into IP addresses.

In Microsoft Windows NT and Unix BIND name servers, the DNS database of host name to IP address mappings must be created manually by entering resource records for each host that needs to be resolved. In Windows 2000/XP/2003, the new dynamic update can be used to register host names automatically, and zone information can be stored and replicated using Active Directory.
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Domain Name System

Each name server on the Internet is responsible for a subset of the DNS namespace known as a zone of authority. Each zone of authority can consist of one or more domains and subdomains. The most important name servers on the Internet are the dozen or so root names servers, which are responsible for maintaining the infrastructure of the domain name system. These main root name servers are maintained mostly by the Network Information Center (InterNIC) and by U.S. military agencies.

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Reference Slides

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DNS Namespace
All domains and subdomains within the Domain Name System (DNS). DNS uses a namespace that is hierarchical in structure and is stored as a distributed database on servers called name servers. The term namespace can have two meanings: The abstract space of fully qualified domain names (FQDNs) that are used to identify hosts on the Internet or on a private corporate TCP/IP internetwork. The physical space of DNS database files (zone files) that exist on name servers and that actually define or contain the abstract DNS namespace Active Directory in Microsoft Windows 2000 requires that a DNS namespace be configured in a domain-based implementation of Windows 2000 in an enterprise.
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Root Domain
A domain in a domain tree of a Microsoft Windows 2000 based network that is the highest-level parent domain in the tree. All other domains in the tree derive their Domain Name System (DNS) name from the root domain and form a contiguous namespace with the root domain. An example of a root domain name for a company called Expedia might be expedia.com. The root domain is the first domain you create when you implement Active Directory in an enterprise. All other domains you create derive their DNS name from the root domain.

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Top-level Domain
Any domain that is directly under the root domain in the hierarchical Domain Name System (DNS). Top-level domains are few in number and are used to identify broad classes of Internet services. Except for country domains, the various top-level domains currently in existence are listed in the following table. A number of additional top-level domains are yet to be finalized and implemented.
Domain .com .edu .org .net Description Commercial organizations and companies and personal domains Mostly U.S. universities and colleges Nonprofit organizations Networking and telecommunications companies

.gov
.mil

American government branches and agencies

U.S. military

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 Historically, the first of these were assigned to the US, but recent changes in policy have meant that these domains, named global Top Level Domains (gTLD), are now considered global in nature. Outside the U.S., each country generally uses a top level domain of its own named after two-letter country code defined in ISO-3166.

Note:
National domains do not imply that a host below that domain is actually located in that country; it means only that the host has been registered with that countrys NIC.

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fully-qualified domain name (FQDN)

In the Domain Name System (DNS), a dotted name that fully identifies a TCP/IP host on the Internet. A fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of a host consists of its host name dotted together with its domain name and any names of subdomains in which the host resides. FQDNs are used in Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) for accessing Web pages on the Internet and provide an absolute path through the DNS namespace to the target host on which the Web page resides. They are also sometimes called absolute domain names.

Example: For the FQDN server7.microsoft.com, the TCP/IP host name is server7 and its domain is microsoft.com.

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Name server
A host on the Internet or on a TCP/IP internetwork that can be used to resolve host names into IP addresses. Name servers are an essential component of the Domain Name System (DNS), which provides the namespace of all hosts on the Internet or on a private TCP/IP internetwork. Because of name servers, when you want to access or reference a host on a TCP/IP network, you can use its friendly DNS name instead of its IP address, which is generally harder to remember.

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DNS client
A client machine configured to send name resolution queries to a DNS server. A DNS client is also called a resolver. When a client needs to resolve a remote hosts name into its IP address, it sends a request to the DNS server, which returns the IP address of the remote host. DNS client software, which is built into most machines that have TCP/IP installed, enables the machines to issue DNS queries to name servers. For example, on Microsoft Windows platforms, the DNS client software makes possible the use of DNS names for browsing the Internet using Microsoft Internet Explorer.

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