[UFO Chicago] implementing internal DNS

[Christopher D. Heer]

Politik Durden wrote:
> This may be slightly off topic but I have a feeling that the solution 
> involves some open source tools:
>
> I have 8 clients with a mix of wireless and wired. Mix of Macs and 
> PCs. OSes running are MacOS, Windows, and one Fedora 11 box.
>
> All clients DHCP to a Motorola WR850G wireless access 
> point/router/kitchen sink device, with some clients using the wired 
> ports.
>
> This device then DHCP's to my cable modem connected to our Comcast 
> broadband service.
>
> I want internal users to have certain urls resolve to internal 
> resources (a web server, nas device, print server, whatever). How do I 
> set this up ? I want a centralized solution so I don't have to make 
> changes to each client. Is there a way for me to create some sort of 
> poor mans DNS table and have all clients check this table first, 
> before going to an external DNS server ? Generally speaking, do those 
> kitchen sink/gateway/router/DHCP/everything boxes have this kind of 
> functionality ?  Or am I going to have to run an internal DNS server ? 
> That just sounds way too scary so I'm hoping someone has an easier 
> solution.
>
> Thanks in advance for your input :-)
>
I'm sure you can do it on a gateway/router/etc. with replacement 
firmware like DD-WRT; not sure if they allow that sort of customization 
with the stock firmware.  I've never tried.

I'm doing exactly what you're proposing simply with a DNS server.  Just 
an old clunker sitting in a corner running Linux and dnsmasq.  I use it 
for DHCP as well, although that's certainly not required.  I just add 
entries to /etc/hosts for anything internal.  This has the added 
advantage of allowing name resolutions (at least for internal items) to 
work even if the Internet is down.

The Linux box isn't doing zone transfers with my ISP or anything 
complicated; I just have its resolv.conf pointing to my ISP's DNS 
servers.  Took only a few minutes to set up.

--chris