Subj : defnode To : Tony Langdon From : mark lewis Date : Sat Aug 20 2016 11:12 am 20 Aug 16 21:21, you wrote to me: ml>> those discussions were back in 2012 but apparently i failed to lock ml>> the ones concerning this format of the domain lines and i don't see ml>> anything in the FAQ about it :( TL> Yes, I never knew about this format until you mentioned it here. Keen TL> to know more. It's not in any of my examples. ml>> it absolutely does make more sense... the real trick is to get ml>> othernets to set up their own DNS lookup domain zones... TL> What's involved in setting the lookup service up? basically it is two parts... 1. have a script to convert the nodelist into a/some DNS zone files for whatever DNS host server software is being used. 2. set up a DNS host server to use the zone files created in step 1 and allow public access to that DNS server so anyone in the world can look up fzzz.nyyy.zxxx.your.domain. TL> I can register and administer domains (have done for years, though in TL> this case, it would be a subdomain of an existing domain), and I TL> recently started an othernet, so I would be interested in what I'd TL> need to do to setup the service for my net. the folks running binkp.net would have more information than the little i have... i know the concepts and have run my own stuff in the distant past but don't remember all the details... the main thing is that the addresses in the nodelist are converted to the f.n.z format in the zone file that the DNS server presents to the world when queries are made of it... some DNS servers use a simple HOSTS file type of format... others are akin to what bind uses... so basically, you have the overall othernet domain with at least one zone sub-domain (zxxx) with at least one net sub-domain (nyyy) and each FTN node in that FTN net has a host entry in that net's sub-domain (fzzz)... a lookup for fzzz.nyyy.zxxx.othernet.domain will return either the IP number from the nodelist or a CNAME if the nodelist contains host.domain.name for that node... in these examples, 'xxx' is the zone number, 'yyy' is the net number and 'zzz' is the node number... the 'f', 'n' and 'z' are important... eg: f99.n276.z486.some.othernet == 486:276/99 point addresses would have a 'p' leading them if you publish points in your zone file... otherwise, a wildcard will also be needed for each node so that any connection attempts to deliver point mail are sent to the node hosting the points... i think i've covered most all of it... does it make sense to you?? )\/(ark Always Mount a Scratch Monkey .... "God Jul och Gott Nytt aar." - Swedish Christmas --- * Origin: (1:3634/12.73) .