Re: [cobalt-developers] Sub-domain Question (please help)

[Jeff Lasman <jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Okay, I suppose I'm going to have to answer this, as much as I don't
like wildcard DNS and as sure as I am that it will eventually bite
you...

"DNS and Bind", the O'Reilly book only describes the use of wildcards in
MX records, but they will work in other record types as well.

So you could have a record like this:

*   IN   A   192.253.253.113

but the problem is that this will ONLY work for domains for which there
are NO other records in the DNS.

For example, if you then have a record such as:

manny  IN  NS  ns1.yourdomain.com

and another such as:

moe    IN  MX  mail.yourdomain.com

and another such as;

jack   IN  ns  ns1.yourdomain.com

then john.yourdomain.com will resolve to 192.253.253.113, but
manny.yourdomain.com, moe.yourdomain.com, and jack.yourdomain.com won't
resolve.

Sure you can keep track of this when you first create the records, but
how about over the years as your DNS grows?

Also, according to DNS and Bind, page 378, "The danger with wildcards is
that they clash with search lists."

Read the appropriate sections of DNS and Bind.  If you understand them
perfectly and know you still need to use wildcards, then use them. 
Beware.

(And I have no idea if they work within the constrains of the gui or
not, since I've never tried them there.)

And once you've used them, then how do you "move" the request to a
subdirectory?  Do you already have a copy of info.cgi?  Have fun <wry
grin>.

BTW, I like to do what you're doing, too.  It's easy on a non-Cobalt-RaQ
generic linux system; you just create a virtual domain for
"manny.yourname.com" and make the default directory
"yourname.com/manny".  Works fine, but not with the RaQ gui.

Jeff

Michael wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> We would like to offer something on our server that will forward a
> sub-domain *.yourname.com to a sub-directory yourname.com/*.  Is there
> anyway that this can be done?
> 
> An example of this is available here:
> 
> http://www.domaindirect.com/cgi-bin/info.cgi?salesid=&do=sub-domain&ref=DDos
> rs00.
> 
> I've been told that DNS wildcards can be enabled and then you can use a
> script to get this to work.  If that is the case, and the only way of doing
> this, then how would I enable wildcards on *.yourname.com?
-- 
Jeff Lasman <jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
nobaloney.net
P. O. Box 52672
Riverside, CA  92517
voice: (909) 787-8589  *  fax: (909) 782-0205