Dynamic Updates in the Domain Name System (DNS UPDATE)
draft-ietf-dnsind-dynDNS-10
The information below is for an old version of the document that is already published as an RFC.
| Document | Type |
This is an older version of an Internet-Draft that was ultimately published as RFC 2136.
|
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Authors | Paul A. Vixie , Dr. Susan Thomson , Yakov Rekhter , Jim Bound | ||
| Last updated | 2020-01-21 (Latest revision 1996-11-09) | ||
| RFC stream | Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) | ||
| Intended RFC status | (None) | ||
| Formats | |||
| Additional resources | Mailing list discussion | ||
| Stream | WG state | (None) | |
| Document shepherd | (None) | ||
| IESG | IESG state | Became RFC 2136 (Proposed Standard) | |
| Consensus boilerplate | Unknown | ||
| Telechat date | (None) | ||
| Responsible AD | (None) | ||
| Send notices to | (None) |
draft-ietf-dnsind-dynDNS-10
DNSIND Working Group Paul Vixie (Ed.) (ISC)
INTERNET-DRAFT Susan Thomson (Bellcore)
<draft-ietf-dnsind-dynDNS-10.txt> Yakov Rekhter (Cisco)
Jim Bound (DEC)
Amends: RFC 1035 November 1996
Dynamic Updates in the Domain Name System (DNS UPDATE)
Status of this Memo
This document is an Internet-Draft. Internet-Drafts are working
documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas,
and its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts.
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
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ftp.isi.edu (US West Coast).
Abstract
The Domain Name System was originally designed to support queries of
a statically configured database. While the data was expected to
change, the frequency of those changes was expected to be fairly low,
and all updates were made as external edits to a zone's Master File.
Using this specification of the UPDATE opcode, it is possible to add
or delete RRs or RRsets from a specified zone. Prerequisites are
specified separately from update operations, and can specify a
dependency upon either the previous existence or nonexistence of an
RRset, or the existence of a single RR.
UPDATE is atomic, i.e., all prerequisites must be satisfied or else
no update operations will take place. There are no data dependent
error conditions defined after the prerequisites have been met.
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1 - Definitions
This document intentionally gives more definition to the roles of
``Master,'' ``Slave,'' and ``Primary Master'' servers, and their
enumeration in NS RRs, and the SOA MNAME field. In that sense, the
following server type definitions can be considered an addendum to
[RFC1035], and are intended to be consistent with [RFC1996]:
Slave an authoritative server that uses AXFR or IXFR to
retrieve the zone and is named in the zone's NS
RRset.
Master an authoritative server configured to be the source
of AXFR or IXFR data for one or more slave servers.
Primary Master master server at the root of the AXFR/IXFR dependency
graph. The primary master is named in the zone's SOA
MNAME field and optionally by an NS RR. There is by
definition only one primary master server per zone.
A domain name identifies a node within the domain name space tree
structure. Each node has a set (possibly empty) of Resource Records
(RRs). All RRs having the same NAME, CLASS and TYPE are called a
Resource Record Set (RRset).
The pseudocode used in this document is for example purposes only. If
it is found to disagree with the text, the text shall be considered
authoritative. If the text is found to be ambiguous, the pseudocode can
be used to help resolve the ambiguity.
1.1 - Comparison Rules
1.1.1. Two RRs are considered equal if their NAME, CLASS, TYPE, RDLENGTH
and RDATA fields are equal. Note that the time-to-live (TTL) field is
explicitly excluded from the comparison.
1.1.2. The rules for comparison of character strings in names are
specified in [RFC1035 2.3.3].
1.1.3. Wildcarding is disabled. That is, a wildcard (``*'') in an
update only matches a wildcard (``*'') in the zone, and vice versa.
1.1.4. Aliasing is disabled: A CNAME in the zone matches a CNAME in the
update, and will not otherwise be followed. All UPDATE operations are
done on the basis of canonical names.
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1.1.5. The following RR types cannot be appended to an RRset. If the
following comparison rules are met, then an attempt to add the new RR
will result in the replacement of the previous RR:
SOA compare only NAME, CLASS and TYPE -- it is not possible to
have more than one SOA per zone, even if any of the data
fields differ.
WKS compare only NAME, CLASS, TYPE, ADDRESS, and PROTOCOL -- only
one WKS RR is possible for this tuple, even if the services
masks differ.
CNAME compare only NAME, CLASS, and TYPE -- it is not possible to
have more than one CNAME RR, even if their data fields differ.
1.2 - Glue RRs
For the purpose of determining whether a domain name used in the UPDATE
protocol is contained within a specified zone, a domain name is ``in'' a
zone if it is owned by that zone's domain name. See section 7.18 for
details.
1.3 - New Assigned Numbers
CLASS = NONE (TBD: 254)
RCODE = YXDOMAIN (TBD: 6)
RCODE = YXRRSET (TBD: 7)
RCODE = NXRRSET (TBD: 8)
RCODE = NOTAUTH (TBD: 9)
RCODE = NOTZONE (TBD: 10?)
Opcode = UPDATE (5)
2 - Update Message Format
The DNS Message Format is defined by [RFC1035 4.1]. Some extensions are
necessary (for example, more error codes are possible under UPDATE than
under QUERY) and some fields must be overloaded (see description of
CLASS fields below).
The overall format of an UPDATE message is, following [ibid]:
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+---------------------+
| Header |
+---------------------+
| Zone | specifies the zone to be updated
+---------------------+
| Prerequisite | RRs or RRsets which must (not) preexist
+---------------------+
| Update | RRs or RRsets to be added or deleted
+---------------------+
| Additional Data | additional data
+---------------------+
The Header Section specifies that this message is an UPDATE, and
describes the size of the other sections. The Zone Section names the
zone that is to be updated by this message. The Prerequisite Section
specifies the starting invariants (in terms of zone content) required
for this update. The Update Section contains the edits to be made, and
the Additional Data Section contains data which may be necessary to
complete, but is not part of, this update.
2.1 - Transport Issues
An update transaction may be carried in a UDP datagram, if the request
fits, or in a TCP connection (at the discretion of the requestor). When
TCP is used, the message is in the format described in [RFC1035 4.2.2].
2.2 - Message Header
The header of the DNS Message Format is defined by [RFC 1035 4.1]. Not
all opcodes define the same set of flag bits, though as a practical
matter most of the bits defined for QUERY (in [ibid]) are identically
defined by the other opcodes. UPDATE uses only one flag bit (QR).
The DNS Message Format specifies record counts for its four sections
(Question, Answer, Authority, and Additional). UPDATE uses the same
fields, and the same section formats, but the naming and use of these
sections differs as shown in the following modified header, after
[RFC1035 4.1.1]:
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1 1 1 1 1 1
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| ID |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
|QR| Opcode | Z | RCODE |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| ZOCOUNT |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| PRCOUNT |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| UPCOUNT |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| ADCOUNT |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
These fields are used as follows:
ID A 16-bit identifier assigned by the entity that generates any
kind of request. This identifier is copied in the
corresponding reply and can be used by the requestor to match
replies to outstanding requests, or by the server to detect
duplicated requests from some requestor.
QR A one bit field that specifies whether this message is a
request (0), or a response (1).
Opcode A four bit field that specifies the kind of request in this
message. This value is set by the originator of a request
and copied into the response. The Opcode value that
identifies an UPDATE message is five (5).
Z Reserved for future use. Should be zero (0) in all requests
and responses. A non-zero Z field should be ignored by
implementations of this specification.
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RCODE Response code - this four bit field is undefined in requests
and set in responses. The values and meanings of this field
within responses are as follows:
Mneumonic Value Description
------------------------------------------------------------
NOERROR 0 No error condition.
FORMERR 1 The name server was unable to interpret
the request due to a format error.
SERVFAIL 2 The name server encountered an internal
failure while processing this request,
for example an operating system error
or a forwarding timeout.
NXDOMAIN 3 Some name that ought to exist,
does not exist.
NOTIMP 4 The name server does not support
the specified Opcode.
REFUSED 5 The name server refuses to perform the
specified operation for policy or
security reasons.
YXDOMAIN 6? Some name that ought not to exist,
does exist.
YXRRSET 7? Some RRset that ought not to exist,
does exist.
NXRRSET 8? Some RRset that ought to exist,
does not exist.
NOTAUTH 9? The server is not authoritative for
the zone named in the Zone Section.
NOTZONE 10? A name used in the Prerequisite or
Update Section is not within the
zone denoted by the Zone Section.
ZOCOUNT The number of RRs in the Zone Section.
PRCOUNT The number of RRs in the Prerequisite Section.
UPCOUNT The number of RRs in the Update Section.
ADCOUNT The number of RRs in the Additional Data Section.
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2.3 - Zone Section
The Zone Section has the same format as that specified in [RFC1035
4.1.2], with the fields redefined as follows:
1 1 1 1 1 1
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| |
/ ZNAME /
/ /
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| ZTYPE |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| ZCLASS |
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
UPDATE uses this section to denote the zone of the records being
updated. All records to be updated must be in the same zone, and
therefore the Zone Section is allowed to contain exactly one record.
The ZNAME is the zone name, the ZTYPE must be SOA, and the ZCLASS is the
zone's class.
2.4 - Prerequisite Section
This section contains a set of RRset prerequisites which must be
satisfied at the time the UPDATE packet is received by the primary
master server. The format of this section is as specified by [RFC1035
4.1.3]. There are five possible sets of semantics that can be expressed
here, summarized as follows and then explained below.
(1) RRset exists (value independent). At least one RR with a
specified NAME and TYPE (in the zone and class specified by the
Zone Section) must exist.
(2) RRset exists (value dependent). A set of RRs with a specified
NAME and TYPE exists and has the same members with the same
RDATAs as the RRset specified here in this Section.
(3) RRset does not exist. No RRs with a specified NAME and TYPE (in
the zone and class denoted by the Zone Section) can exist.
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(4) Name is in use. At least one RR with a specified NAME (in the
zone and class specified by the Zone Section) must exist. Note
that this prerequisite is NOT satisfied by empty nonterminals.
(5) Name is not in use. No RR of any type is owned by a specified
NAME. Note that this prerequisite IS satisfied by empty
nonterminals.
The syntax of these is as follows:
2.4.1 - RRset Exists (Value Independent)
At least one RR with a specified NAME and TYPE (in the zone and class
specified in the Zone Section) must exist.
For this prerequisite, a requestor adds to the section a single RR whose
NAME and TYPE are equal to that of the zone RRset whose existence is
required. RDLENGTH is zero and RDATA is therefore empty. CLASS must be
specified as ANY to differentiate this condition from that of an actual
RR whose RDLENGTH is naturally zero (0) (e.g., NULL). TTL is specified
as zero (0).
2.4.2 - RRset Exists (Value Dependent)
A set of RRs with a specified NAME and TYPE exists and has the same
members with the same RDATAs as the RRset specified here in this
section. While RRset ordering is undefined and therefore not
significant to this comparison, the sets be identical in their extent.
For this prerequisite, a requestor adds to the section an entire RRset
whose preexistence is required. NAME and TYPE are that of the RRset
being denoted. CLASS is that of the zone. TTL must be specified as
zero (0) and is ignored when comparing RRsets for identity.
2.4.3 - RRset Does Not Exist
No RRs with a specified NAME and TYPE (in the zone and class denoted by
the Zone Section) can exist.
For this prerequisite, a requestor adds to the section a single RR whose
NAME and TYPE are equal to that of the RRset whose nonexistence is
required. The RDLENGTH of this record is zero (0), and RDATA field is
therefore empty. CLASS must be specified as NONE in order to
distinguish this condition from a valid RR whose RDLENGTH is naturally
zero (0) (for example, the NULL RR). TTL must be specified as zero (0).
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2.4.4 - Name Is In Use
Name is in use. At least one RR with a specified NAME (in the zone and
class specified by the Zone Section) must exist. Note that this
prerequisite is NOT satisfied by empty nonterminals.
For this prerequisite, a requestor adds to the section a single RR whose
NAME is equal to that of the name whose ownership of an RR is required.
RDLENGTH is zero and RDATA is therefore empty. CLASS must be specified
as ANY to differentiate this condition from that of an actual RR whose
RDLENGTH is naturally zero (0) (e.g., NULL). TYPE must be specified as
ANY to differentiate this case from that of an RRset existence test.
TTL is specified as zero (0).
2.4.5 - Name Is Not In Use
Name is not in use. No RR of any type is owned by a specified NAME.
Note that this prerequisite IS satisfied by empty nonterminals.
For this prerequisite, a requestor adds to the section a single RR whose
NAME is equal to that of the name whose nonownership of any RRs is
required. RDLENGTH is zero and RDATA is therefore empty. CLASS must be
specified as NONE. TYPE must be specified as ANY. TTL must be
specified as zero (0).
2.5 - Update Section
This section contains RRs to be added to or deleted from the zone. The
format of this section is as specified by [RFC1035 4.1.3]. There are
four possible sets of semantics, summarized below and with details to
follow.
(1) Add RRs to an RRset.
(2) Delete an RRset.
(3) Delete all RRsets from a name.
(4) Delete an RR from an RRset.
The syntax of these is as follows:
2.5.1 - Add To An RRset
RRs are added to the Update Section whose NAME, TYPE, TTL, RDLENGTH and
RDATA are those being added, and CLASS is the same as the zone class.
Any duplicate RRs will be silently ignored by the primary master.
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2.5.2 - Delete An RRset
One RR is added to the Update Section whose NAME and TYPE are those of
the RRset to be deleted. TTL must be specified as zero (0) and is
otherwise not used by the primary master. CLASS must be specified as
ANY. RDLENGTH must be zero (0) and RDATA must therefore be empty. If
no such RRset exists, then this Update RR will be silently ignored by
the primary master.
2.5.3 - Delete All RRsets From A Name
One RR is added to the Update Section whose NAME is that of the name to
be cleansed of RRsets. TYPE must be specified as ANY. TTL must be
specified as zero (0) and is otherwise not used by the primary master.
CLASS must be specified as ANY. RDLENGTH must be zero (0) and RDATA
must therefore be empty. If no such RRsets exist, then this Update RR
will be silently ignored by the primary master.
2.5.4 - Delete An RR From An RRset
RRs to be deleted are added to the Update Section. The NAME, TYPE,
RDLENGTH and RDATA must match the RR being deleted. TTL must be
specified as zero (0) and will otherwise be ignored by the primary
master. CLASS must be specified as NONE to distinguish this from an RR
addition. If no such RRs exist, then this Update RR will be silently
ignored by the primary master.
2.6 - Additional Data Section
This section contains RRs which are related to the update itself, or to
new RRs being added by the update. For example, out of zone glue (A RRs
referred to by new NS RRs) should be presented here. The server can use
or ignore out of zone glue, at the discretion of the server implementor.
The format of this section is as specified by [RFC1035 4.1.3].
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3 - Server Behavior
A server, upon receiving an UPDATE request, will signal NOTIMP to the
requestor if the UPDATE opcode is not recognized or if it is recognized
but has not been implemented. Otherwise, processing continues as
follows.
3.1 - Process Zone Section
3.1.1. The Zone Section is checked to see that there is exactly one RR
therein and that the RR's ZTYPE is SOA, else signal FORMERR to the
requestor. Next, the ZNAME and ZCLASS are checked to see if the zone so
named is one of this server's authority zones, else signal NOTAUTH to
the requestor. If the server is a zone slave, the request will be
forwarded toward the primary master.
3.1.2 - Pseudocode For Zone Section Processing
if (zcount != 1 || ztype != SOA)
return (FORMERR)
if (zone_type(zname, zclass) == SLAVE)
return forward()
if (zone_type(zname, zclass) == MASTER)
return update()
return (NOTAUTH)
Sections 3.2 through 3.8 describe the primary master's behaviour,
whereas Section 6 describes a forwarder's behaviour.
3.2 - Process Prerequisite Section
Next, the Prerequisite Section is checked to see that all prerequisites
are satisfied by the current state of the zone. Using the definitions
expressed in Section 1.2, if any RR's NAME is not within the zone
specified in the Zone Section, signal NOTZONE to the requestor.
3.2.1. For RRs in this section whose CLASS is ANY, test to see that TTL
and RDLENGTH are both zero (0), else signal FORMERR to the requestor.
If TYPE is ANY, test to see that there is at least one RR in the zone
whose NAME is the same as that of the Prerequisite RR, else signal
NXDOMAIN to the requestor. If TYPE is not ANY, test to see that there
is at least one RR in the zone whose NAME and TYPE are the same as that
of the Prerequisite RR, else signal NXRRSET to the requestor.
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3.2.2. For RRs in this section whose CLASS is NONE, test to see that the
TTL and RDLENGTH are both zero (0), else signal FORMERR to the
requestor. If the TYPE is ANY, test to see that there are no RRs in the
zone whose NAME is the same as that of the Prerequisite RR, else signal
YXDOMAIN to the requestor. If the TYPE is not ANY, test to see that
there are no RRs in the zone whose NAME and TYPE are the same as that of
the Prerequisite RR, else signal YXRRSET to the requestor.
3.2.3. For RRs in this section whose CLASS is the same as the ZCLASS,
test to see that the TTL is zero (0), else signal FORMERR to the
requestor. Then, build an RRset for each unique <NAME,TYPE> and compare
each resulting RRset for set equality (same members, no more, no less)
with RRsets in the zone. If any Prerequisite RRset is not entirely and
exactly matched by a zone RRset, signal NXRRSET to the requestor. If
any RR in this section has a CLASS other than ZCLASS or NONE or ANY,
signal FORMERR to the requestor.
3.2.4 - Table Of Metavalues Used In Prerequisite Section
CLASS TYPE RDATA Meaning
------------------------------------------------------------
ANY ANY empty Name is in use
ANY rrset empty RRset exists (value independent)
NONE ANY empty Name is not in use
NONE rrset empty RRset does not exist
zone rrset rr RRset exists (value dependent)
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3.2.5 - Pseudocode for Prerequisite Section Processing
for rr in prerequisites
if (rr.ttl != 0)
return (FORMERR)
if (zone_of(rr.name) != ZNAME)
return (NOTZONE);
if (rr.class == ANY)
if (rr.rdlength != 0)
return (FORMERR)
if (rr.type == ANY)
if (!zone_name<rr.name>)
return (NXDOMAIN)
else
if (!zone_rrset<rr.name, rr.type>)
return (NXRRSET)
if (rr.class == NONE)
if (rr.rdlength != 0)
return (FORMERR)
if (rr.type == ANY)
if (zone_name<rr.name>)
return (YXDOMAIN)
else
if (zone_rrset<rr.name, rr.type>)
return (YXRRSET)
if (rr.class == zclass)
temp<rr.name, rr.type> += rr
else
return (FORMERR)
for rrset in temp
if (zone_rrset<rrset.name, rrset.type> != rrset)
return (NXRRSET)
3.3 - Check Requestor's Permissions
3.3.1. Next, the requestor's permission to update the RRs named in the
Update Section may be tested in an implementation dependent fashion or
using mechanisms specified in a subsequent Secure DNS Update protocol.
If the requestor does not have permission to perform these updates, the
server may write a warning message in its operations log, and may either
signal REFUSED to the requestor, or ignore the permission problem and
proceed with the update.
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3.3.2. While the exact processing is implementation defined, if these
verification activities are to be performed, this is the point in the
server's processing where such performance should take place, since if a
REFUSED condition is encountered after an update has been partially
applied, it will be necessary to undo the partial update and restore the
zone to its original state before answering the requestor.
3.3.3 - Pseudocode for Permission Checking
if (security policy exists)
if (this update is not permitted)
if (local option)
log a message about permission problem
if (local option)
return (REFUSED)
3.4 - Process Update Section
Next, the Update Section is processed as follows.
3.4.1 - Prescan
The Update Section is parsed into RRs and each RR's CLASS is checked to
see if it is ANY, NONE, or the same as the Zone Class, else signal a
FORMERR to the requestor. Using the definitions in Section 1.2, each
RR's NAME must be in the zone specified by the Zone Section, else signal
NOTZONE to the requestor.
3.4.1.2. For RRs whose CLASS is not ANY, check the TYPE and if it is
ANY, AXFR, MAILA, MAILB, or any other QUERY metatype, or any
unrecognized type, then signal FORMERR to the requestor. For RRs whose
CLASS is ANY or NONE, check the TTL to see that it is zero (0), else
signal a FORMERR to the requestor. For any RR whose CLASS is ANY, check
the RDLENGTH to make sure that it is zero (0) (that is, the RDATA field
is empty), and that the TYPE is not AXFR, MAILA, MAILB, or any other
QUERY metatype besides ANY, or any unrecognized type, else signal
FORMERR to the requestor.
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3.4.1.3 - Pseudocode For Update Section Prescan
[rr] for rr in updates
if (zone_of(rr.name) != ZNAME)
return (NOTZONE);
if (rr.class == zclass)
if (rr.type & ANY|AXFR|MAILA|MAILB)
return (FORMERR)
elsif (rr.class == ANY)
if (rr.ttl != 0 || rr.rdlength != 0
|| rr.type & AXFR|MAILA|MAILB)
return (FORMERR)
elsif (rr.class == NONE)
if (rr.ttl != 0 || rr.type & ANY|AXFR|MAILA|MAILB)
return (FORMERR)
else
return (FORMERR)
3.4.2 - Update
The Update Section is parsed into RRs and these RRs are processed in
order.
3.4.2.1. If any system failure (such as an out of memory condition, or a
hardware error in persistent storage) occurs during the processing of
this section, signal SERVFAIL to the requestor and undo all updates
applied to the zone during this transaction.
3.4.2.2. Any Update RR whose CLASS is the same as ZCLASS is added to the
zone. In case of duplicate RDATAs (which for SOA RRs is always the
case, and for WKS RRs is the case if the ADDRESS and PROTOCOL fields
both match), the Zone RR is replaced by Update RR. If the TYPE is SOA
and there is no Zone SOA RR, or the new SOA.SERIAL is lower (according
to [RFC1982]) than or equal to the current Zone SOA RR's SOA.SERIAL, the
Update RR is ignored. In the case of a CNAME Update RR and a non-CNAME
Zone RRset or vice versa, ignore the CNAME Update RR, otherwise replace
the CNAME Zone RR with the CNAME Update RR.
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3.4.2.3. For any Update RR whose CLASS is ANY and whose TYPE is ANY, all
Zone RRs with the same NAME are deleted, unless the NAME is the same as
ZNAME in which case only those RRs whose TYPE is other than SOA or NS
are deleted. For any Update RR whose CLASS is ANY and whose TYPE is not
ANY all Zone RRs with the same NAME and TYPE are deleted, unless the
NAME is the same as ZNAME in which case neither SOA or NS RRs will be
deleted.
3.4.2.4. For any Update RR whose class is NONE, any Zone RR whose NAME,
TYPE, RDATA and RDLENGTH are equal to the Update RR is deleted, unless
the NAME is the same as ZNAME and either the TYPE is SOA or the TYPE is
NS and the matching Zone RR is the only NS remaining in the RRset, in
which case this Update RR is ignored.
3.4.2.5. Signal NOERROR to the requestor.
3.4.2.6 - Table Of Metavalues Used In Update Section
CLASS TYPE RDATA Meaning
---------------------------------------------------------
ANY ANY empty Delete all RRsets from a name
ANY rrset empty Delete an RRset
NONE rrset rr Delete an RR from an RRset
zone rrset rr Add to an RRset
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3.4.2.7 - Pseudocode For Update Section Processing
[rr] for rr in updates
if (rr.class == zclass)
if (rr.type == CNAME)
if (zone_rrset<rr.name, ~CNAME>)
next [rr]
elsif (zone_rrset<rr.name, CNAME>)
next [rr]
if (rr.type == SOA)
if (!zone_rrset<rr.name, SOA> ||
zone_rr<rr.name, SOA>.serial > rr.soa.serial)
next [rr]
for zrr in zone_rrset<rr.name, rr.type>
if (rr.type == CNAME || rr.type == SOA ||
(rr.type == WKS && rr.proto == zrr.proto &&
rr.address == zrr.address) ||
rr.rdata == zrr.rdata)
zrr = rr
next [rr]
zone_rrset<rr.name, rr.type> += rr
elsif (rr.class == ANY)
if (rr.type == ANY)
if (rr.name == zname)
zone_rrset<rr.name, ~(SOA|NS)> = Nil
else
zone_rrset<rr.name, *> = Nil
elsif (rr.name == zname &&
(rr.type == SOA || rr.type == NS))
next [rr]
else
zone_rrset<rr.name, rr.type> = Nil
elsif (rr.class == NONE)
if (rr.type == SOA)
next [rr]
if (rr.type == NS && zone_rrset<rr.name, NS> == rr)
next [rr]
zone_rr<rr.name, rr.type, rr.data> = Nil
return (NOERROR)
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3.5 - Stability
When a zone is modified by an UPDATE operation, the server must commit
the change to nonvolatile storage before sending a response to the
requestor or answering any queries or transfers for the modified zone.
It is reasonable for a server to store only the update records as long
as a system reboot or power failure will cause these update records to
be incorporated into the zone the next time the server is started. It
is also reasonable for the server to copy the entire modified zone to
nonvolatile storage after each update operation, though this would have
suboptimal performance for large zones.
3.6 - Zone Identity
If the zone's SOA SERIAL is changed by an update operation, that change
must be in a positive direction (using modulo 2**32 arithmetic as
specified by [RFC1982]). Attempts to replace an SOA with one whose
SERIAL is less than the current one will be silently ignored by the
primary master server.
If the zone's SOA's SERIAL is not changed as a result of an update
operation, then the server shall increment it automatically before the
SOA or any changed name or RR or RRset is included in any response or
transfer. The primary master server's implementor might choose to
autoincrement the SOA SERIAL if any of the following events occurs:
(1) Each update operation.
(2) A name, RR or RRset in the zone has changed and has subsequently
been visible to a DNS client since the unincremented SOA was
visible to a DNS client, and the SOA is about to become visible to
a DNS client.
(3) A configurable period of time has elapsed since the last update
operation. This period shall be less than or equal to one third of
the zone refresh time, and the default shall be the lesser of that
maximum and 300 seconds.
(4) A configurable number of updates has been applied since the last
SOA change. The default value for this configuration parameter
shall be one hundred (100).
It is imperative that the zone's contents and the SOA's SERIAL be
tightly synchronized. If the zone appears to change, the SOA must
appear to change as well.
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3.7 - Atomicity
During the processing of an UPDATE transaction, the server must ensure
atomicity with respect to other (concurrent) UPDATE or QUERY
transactions. No two transactions can be processed concurrently if
either depends on the final results of the other; in particular, a QUERY
should not be able to retrieve RRsets which have been partially modified
by a concurrent UPDATE, and an UPDATE should not be able to start from
prerequisites that might not still hold at the completion of some other
concurrent UPDATE. Finally, if two UPDATE transactions would modify the
same names, RRs or RRsets, then such UPDATE transactions must be
serialized.
3.8 - Response
At the end of UPDATE processing, a response code will be known. A
response message is generated by copying the ID and Opcode fields from
the request, and either copying the ZOCOUNT, PRCOUNT, UPCOUNT, and
ADCOUNT fields and associated sections, or placing zeros (0) in the
these ``count'' fields and not including any part of the original
update. The QR bit is set to one (1), and the response is sent back to
the requestor. If the requestor used UDP, then the response will be
sent to the requestor's source UDP port. If the requestor used TCP,
then the response will be sent back on the requestor's open TCP
connection.
4 - Requestor Behaviour
4.1. From a requestor's point of view, any authoritative server for the
zone can appear to be able to process update requests, even though only
the primary master server is actually able to modify the zone's master
file. Requestors are expected to know the name of the zone they intend
to update and to know or be able to determine the name servers for that
zone.
4.2. If update ordering is desired, the requestor will need to know the
value of the existing SOA RR. Requestors who update the SOA RR must
update the SOA SERIAL field in a positive direction (as defined by
[RFC1982]) and also preserve the other SOA fields unless the requestor's
explicit intent is to change them. The SOA SERIAL field must never be
set to zero (0).
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4.3. If the requestor has reasonable cause to believe that all of a
zone's servers will be equally reachable, then it should arrange to try
the primary master server (as given by the SOA MNAME field if matched by
some NS NSDNAME) first to avoid unnecessary forwarding inside the slave
servers. (Note that the primary master will in some cases not be
reachable by all requestors, due to firewalls or network partitioning.)
4.4. Once the zone's name servers been found and possibly sorted so that
the ones more likely to be reachable and/or support the UPDATE opcode
are listed first, the requestor composes an UPDATE message of the
following form and sends it to the first name server on its list:
ID: (new)
Opcode: UPDATE
Zone zcount: 1
Zone zname: (zone name)
Zone zclass: (zone class)
Zone ztype: T_SOA
Prerequisite Section: (see previous text)
Update Section: (see previous text)
Additional Data Section: (empty)
4.5. If the requestor receives a response, and the response has an RCODE
other than SERVFAIL or NOTIMP, then the requestor returns an appropriate
response to its caller.
4.6. If a response is received whose RCODE is SERVFAIL or NOTIMP, or if
no response is received within an implementation dependent timeout
period, or if an ICMP error is received indicating that the server's
port is unreachable, then the requestor will delete the unusable server
from its internal name server list and try the next one, repeating until
the name server list is empty. If the requestor runs out of servers to
try, an appropriate error will be returned to the requestor's caller.
5 - Duplicate Detection, Ordering and Mutual Exclusion
5.1. For correct operation, mechanisms may be needed to ensure
idempotence, order UPDATE requests and provide mutual exclusion. An
UPDATE message or response might be delivered zero times, one time, or
multiple times. Datagram duplication is of particular interest since it
covers the case of the so-called ``replay attack'' where a correct
request is duplicated maliciously by an intruder.
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5.2. Multiple UPDATE requests or responses in transit might be delivered
in any order, due to network topology changes or load balancing, or to
multipath forwarding graphs wherein several slave servers all forward to
the primary master. In some cases, it might be required that the
earlier update not be applied after the later update, where ``earlier''
and ``later'' are defined by an external time base visible to some set
of requestors, rather than by the order of request receipt at the
primary master.
5.3. A requestor can ensure transaction idempotence by explicitly
deleting some ``marker RR'' (rather than deleting the RRset of which it
is a part) and then adding a new ``marker RR'' with a different RDATA
field. The Prerequisite Section should specify that the original
``marker RR'' must be present in order for this UPDATE message to be
accepted by the server.
5.4. If the request is duplicated by a network error, all duplicate
requests will fail since only the first will find the original ``marker
RR'' present and having its known previous value. The decisions of
whether to use such a ``marker RR'' and what RR to use are left up to
the application programmer, though one obvious choice is the zone's SOA
RR as described below.
5.5. Requestors can ensure update ordering by externally synchronizing
their use of successive values of the ``marker RR.'' Mutual exclusion
can be addressed as a degenerate case, in that a single succession of
the ``marker RR'' is all that is needed.
5.6. A special case where update ordering and datagram duplication
intersect is when an RR validly changes to some new value and then back
to its previous value. Without a ``marker RR'' as described above, this
sequence of updates can leave the zone in an undefined state if
datagrams are duplicated.
5.7. To achieve an atomic multitransaction ``read-modify-write'' cycle,
a requestor could first retrieve the SOA RR, and build an UPDATE message
one of whose prerequisites was the old SOA RR. It would then specify
updates that would delete this SOA RR and add a new one with an
incremented SOA SERIAL, along with whatever actual prerequisites and
updates were the object of the transaction. If the transaction
succeeds, the requestor knows that the RRs being changed were not
otherwise altered by any other requestor.
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6 - Forwarding
When a zone slave forwards an UPDATE message upward toward the zone's
primary master server, it must allocate a new ID and prepare to enter
the role of ``forwarding server,'' which is a requestor with respect to
the forward server.
6.1. The set of forward servers will be same as the set of servers this
zone slave would use as the source of AXFR or IXFR data. So, while the
original requestor might have used the zone's NS RRset to locate its
update server, a forwarder always forwards toward its designated zone
master servers.
6.2. If the original requestor used TCP, then the TCP connection from
the requestor is still open and the forwarder must use TCP to forward
the message. If the original requestor used UDP, the forwarder may use
either UDP or TCP to forward the message, at the whim of the
implementor.
6.3. It is reasonable for forward servers to be forwarders themselves,
if the AXFR dependency graph being followed is a deep one involving
firewalls and multiple connectivity realms. In most cases the AXFR
dependency graph will be shallow and the forward server will be the
primary master server.
6.4. The forwarder will not respond to its requestor until it receives a
response from its forward server. UPDATE transactions involving
forwarders are therefore time synchronized with respect to the original
requestor and the primary master server.
6.5. When there are multiple possible sources of AXFR data and therefore
multiple possible forward servers, a forwarder will use the same
fallback strategy with respect to connectivity or timeout errors that it
would use when performing an AXFR. This is implementation dependent.
6.6. When a forwarder receives a response from a forward server, it
copies this response into a new response message, assigns its
requestor's ID to that message, and sends the response back to the
requestor.
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7 - Design, Implementation, Operation, and Protocol Notes
Some of the principles which guided the design of this UPDATE
specification are as follows. Note that these are not part of the
formal specification and any disagreement between this section and any
other section of this document should be resolved in favour of the other
section.
7.1. Using metavalues for CLASS is possible only because all RRs in the
packet are assumed to be in the same zone, and CLASS is an attribute of
a zone rather than of an RRset. (It is for this reason that the Zone
Section is not optional.)
7.2. Since there are no data-present or data-absent errors possible from
processing the Update Section, any necessary data-present and data-
absent dependencies should be specified in the Prerequisite Section.
7.3. The Additional Data Section can be used to supply a server with out
of zone glue that will be needed in referrals. For example, if adding a
new NS RR to HOME.VIX.COM specifying a nameserver called NS.AU.OZ, the A
RR for NS.AU.OZ can be included in the Additional Data Section. Servers
can use this information or ignore it, at the discretion of the
implementor. We discourage caching this information for use in
subsequent DNS responses.
7.4. The Additional Data Section might be used if some of the RRs later
needed for Secure DNS Update are not actually zone updates, but rather
ancillary keys or signatures not intended to be stored in the zone (as
an update would be), yet necessary for validating the update operation.
7.5. It is expected that in the absence of Secure DNS Update, a server
will only accept updates if they come from a source address that has
been statically configured in the server's description of a primary
master zone. DHCP servers would be likely candidates for inclusion in
this statically configured list.
7.6. It is not possible to create a zone using this protocol, since
there is no provision for a slave server to be told who its master
servers are. It is expected that this protocol will be extended in the
future to cover this case. Therefore, at this time, the addition of SOA
RRs is unsupported. For similar reasons, deletion of SOA RRs is also
unsupported.
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7.7. The prerequisite for specifying that a name own at least one RR
differs semantically from QUERY, in that QUERY would return
<NOERROR,ANCOUNT=0> rather than NXDOMAIN if queried for an RRset at this
name, while UPDATE's prerequisite condition [Section 2.4.4] would NOT be
satisfied.
7.8. It is possible for a UDP response to be lost in transit and for a
request to be retried due to a timeout condition. In this case an
UPDATE that was successful the first time it was received by the primary
master might ultimately appear to have failed when the response to a
duplicate request is finally received by the requestor. (This is
because the original prerequisites may no longer be satisfied after the
update has been applied.) For this reason, requestors who require an
accurate response code must use TCP.
7.9. Because a requestor who requires an accurate response code will
initiate their UPDATE transaction using TCP, a forwarder who receives a
request via TCP must forward it using TCP.
7.10. Deferral of SOA SERIAL autoincrements is made possible so that
serial numbers can be conserved and wraparound at 2**32 can be made an
infrequent occurance. Visible (to DNS clients) SOA SERIALs need to
differ if the zone differs. Note that the Authority Section SOA in a
QUERY response is a form of visibility, for the purposes of this
prerequisite.
7.11. A zone's SOA SERIAL should never be set to zero (0) due to
interoperability problems with some older but widely installed
implementations of DNS. When incrementing an SOA SERIAL, if the result
of the increment is zero (0) (as will be true when wrapping around
2**32), it is necessary to increment it again or set it to one (1). See
[RFC1982] for more detail on this subject.
7.12. Due to the TTL minimalization necessary when caching an RRset, it
is recommended that all TTLs in an RRset be set to the same value.
While the DNS Message Format permits variant TTLs to exist in the same
RRset, and this variance can exist inside a zone, such variance will
have counterintuitive results and its use is discouraged.
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7.13. Zone cut management presents some obscure corner cases to the add
and delete operations in the Update Section. It is possible to delete
an NS RR as long as it is not the last NS RR at the root of a zone. If
deleting all RRs from a name, SOA and NS RRs at the root of a zone are
unaffected. If deleting RRsets, it is not possible to delete either SOA
or NS RRsets at the top of a zone. An attempt to add an SOA will be
treated as a replace operation.
7.14. No semantic checking is required in the primary master server when
adding new RRs. Therefore a requestor can cause CNAME or NS or any
other kind of RR to be added even if their target name does not exist or
does not have the proper RRsets to make the original RR useful. Primary
master servers that DO implement this kind of checking should take great
care to avoid out-of-zone dependencies (whose veracity cannot be
authoritatively checked) and should implement all such checking during
the prescan phase.
7.15. Nonterminal or wildcard CNAMEs are not well specified by [RFC1035]
and their use will probably lead to unpredictable results. Their use is
discouraged.
7.16. Empty nonterminals (nodes with children but no RRs of their own)
will cause <NOERROR,ANCOUNT=0> responses to be sent in response to a
query of any type for that name. There is no provision for empty
terminal nodes -- so if all RRs of a terminal node are deleted, the name
is no longer in use, and queries of any type for that name will result
in an NXDOMAIN response.
7.17. In a deep AXFR dependency graph, it has not historically been an
error for slaves to depend mutually upon each other. This configuration
has been used to enable a zone to flow from the primary master to all
slaves even though not all slaves have continuous connectivity to the
primary master. UPDATE's use of the AXFR dependency graph for
forwarding prohibits this kind of dependency loop, since UPDATE
forwarding has no loop detection analagous to the SOA SERIAL pretest
used by AXFR.
7.18. For UPDATE's purposes, a zone is said to own all names at or below
the zone's root. This allows an UPDATE message to add or delete names
below a zone cut so as to create and maintain ``glue'' records needed
for delegation when a name server is within the zone being delegated,
even though a query for this data would result in a referral response.
7.19. Previously existing names which are occluded by a new zone cut are
still considered part of the parent zone, for the purposes of zone
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transfers, even though queries for such names will be referred to the
new subzone's servers. If a zone cut is removed, all parent zone names
that were occluded by it will again become visible to queries. (This is
a clarification of [RFC1034].)
7.20. If a node contains any name server delegations (NS RRs), this node
is said to be owned by the child zone, and the parent will answer only
with a referral to the child zone's servers if queried for a name at or
below the child zone's root, except in the case of a QTYPE=NS query at
the zone cut itself, for which the parent zone's servers would answer
authoritatively. (This is a clarification of [RFC1034].)
7.21. If a server is authoritative for both a zone and its child, then
queries for names at the zone cut between them will be answered
authoritatively using only data from the child zone. (This is a
clarification of [RFC1034].)
7.22. Update ordering using the SOA RR is problematic since there is no
way to know which of a zone's NS RRs represents the primary master, and
the zone slaves can be out of date if their SOA.REFRESH timers have not
elapsed since the last time the zone was changed on the primary master.
We recommend that a zone needing ordered updates use only servers which
implement NOTIFY (see [RFC1996]) and IXFR (see [RFC1995]), and that a
client receiving a prerequisite error while attempting an ordered update
simply retry after a random delay period to allow the zone to settle.
8 - Security Considerations 8.1. In the absence of [SECUPD] or
equivilent technology, the protocol described by this document makes it
possible for anyone who can reach an authoritative name server to alter
the contents of any zones on that server. This is a serious increase in
vulnerability from the current technology. Therefore it is very
strongly recommended that the protocols described in this document not
be used without [SECUPD] or other equivalently strong security measures,
e.g. IPsec.
8.2. A denial of service attack can be launched by flooding an update
forwarder with TCP sessions containing updates that the primary master
server will ultimately refuse due to permission problems. This arises
due to the requirement that an update forwarder receiving a request via
TCP use a synchronous TCP session for its forwarding operation. The
connection management mechanisms of [RFC1035 4.2.2] are sufficient to
prevent large scale damage from such an attack, but not to prevent some
queries from going unanswered during the attack.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the IETF DNSIND working group for their input and
assistance, in particular, Rob Austein, Randy Bush, Donald Eastlake,
Masataka Ohta, Mark Andrews, and Robert Elz. Special thanks to Bill
Simpson, Ken Wallich and Bob Halley for reviewing this document.
References
[RFC1035]
P. Mockapetris, ``Domain Names - Implementation and Specification,''
RFC 1035, USC/Information Sciences Institute, November 1987.
[RFC1982]
R. Elz, ``Serial Number Arithmetic,'' RFC 1982, University of
Melbourne, August 1996.
[RFC1995]
M. Ohta, ``Incremental Zone Transfer,'' RFC 1995, Tokyo Institute of
Technology, August 1996.
[RFC1996]
P. Vixie, ``A Mechanism for Prompt Notification of Zone Changes,''
RFC 1996, Internet Software Consortium, August 1996.
[DNSSEC]
Donald E. Eastlake and Charles W. Kaufman, ``Domain Name System
Protocol Security Extensions,'' Internet Draft, August 1996, <draft-
ietf-dnssec-secext-10.txt>.
[SECUPD]
Donald E. Eastlake, ``Secure Domain Name System Dynamic Update,''
Internet Draft, March 1997, <draft-ietf-dnssec-update-02.txt>
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Authors' Addresses
Yakov Rekhter Susan Thomson
Cisco Systems Bellcore
170 West Tasman Drive 445 South Street
San Jose, CA 95134-1706 Morristown, NJ 07960
+1 914 528 0090 +1 201 829 4514
<yakov@cisco.com> <set@thumper.bellcore.com>
Jim Bound Paul Vixie
Digital Equipment Corp. Internet Software Consortium
110 Spitbrook Rd ZK3-3/U14 Star Route Box 159A
Nashua, NH 03062-2698 Woodside, CA 94062
+1 603 881 0400 +1 415 747 0204
<bound@zk3.dec.com> <paul@vix.com>
Expires May 1997 [Page 28]