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Solaris 10: configure and enable DNS Client service

2025-08-23Linux/AIX

A DNS Client service is a component that resolves and caches Domain Name System (DNS) domain names. When the DNS Client service receives a request from the user or from a whatever process to resolve a DNS name that it does not contain in its cache, it queries an assigned DNS server on port 53 for an IP address corresponding to that name. If the DNS Client service receives the requested address, it stores the name and address in its cache to resolve future requests without having to query the DNS server.

All systems that use DNS to resolve domain names (including DNS servers and domain controllers) use the DNS Client service for this purpose and Solaris makes no difference. If you want to enable this feature, you must follow the following steps.

Configuration

  1. Login as “root” user:

su – root

  1. Edit file /etc/nsswitch.conf, specifying the sequence through which the operating system has to resolve DNS names, as follows:

vi /etc/nsswitch.conf

hosts: files dns It’s very important that tag “files” remains first, otherwise you may invalidate the boot of your machine!

  1. Create a file named /etc/resolv.conf, specifying the membership domains of your host (which will also become the reference domains used to carry out searches) followed by IP address of your DNS servers:

vi /etc/resolv.conf

search _domain1_ _domain2_ _domain3_ nameserver _primaryIP_ nameserver _secondaryIP_ For example:

vi /etc/resolv.conf

search lucamerello.wordpress.org lucamerello.org lucamerello.com nameserver 192.168.0.1 nameserver 192.168.0.2

  1. Finally, enable DNS Client service:

svcadm enable svc:/network/dns/client:default

and verify its status and log:

svcs -x svc:/network/dns/client:default

svc:/network/dns/client:default (DNS resolver) State: online since May 2, 2014 12:35:45 PM CEST See: man -M /usr/share/man -s 3RESOLV resolver See: /var/svc/log/network-dns-client:default.log Impact: None.

Test

At this point, it’s time to interrogate DNS servers and perform DNS lookups in order to test previous configuration.

  1. Run a query to obtain an IP address for a resource named _hostname_:

dig _hostname_ +search

where the +search option forces the use (not enabled by default) of the DNS domains list defined by the “search” tag in /etc/resolv.conf. Otherwise, if you don’t want to add this option, you’re required to highlight the domain membership of _hostname_:

dig _hostname.domain_

  1. Accomplish a reverse lookup (i.e. mapping IP addresses to DNS names), looking for the DNS name of _address_:

dig -x _address_

Troubleshooting

If you had any trouble during configuration, you can disable the service, make corrections and then re-enable it:

svcadm disable svc:/network/dns/client:default

svcadm enable svc:/network/dns/client:default

Moreover, if DNS name resolution gives unexpected results, you can try to fix it cleaning up your cache:

/usr/sbin/nscd -i hosts

or checking its use statistics:

/usr/sbin/nscd -g

That’s all, make good use! 😀 Advertisements### Share this:

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