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Install Bind on ClarkConnect Home 3.1

ClarkConnect is a nice Linux distribution for a home server and it is especially suitable for a computer sitting in a closet without a display as the web based GUI makes it a snap to configure it (even if you, like me, after a while tend to do all the maintenance through a SSH console connection).

Many people that use ClarkConnect will probably want to use it to host their own sites. At least I did and I quickly realised the limitations of the included caching DNS server (dnsmasq). It is very well for supporting local users that want to access Internet access but it is no good for holding your master DNS information. After some trouble I managed to switch the included dnsmasq to the full-blown ICS BIND implementation.

While I initially did this for ClarkConnect Home 3.1 and later upgraded my server to 3.2 it should work for ClarkConnect Home 3.2 as well.

I assume that you have a standard installation of ClarkConnect Home 3.1/3.2 and have learned how to get a SSH connection to your server.

Note that I have used RPM files to install as I didn't have the development packages installed at the time I did this. If you want to compile Bind yourself then that is of course possible.

  1. Ensure that the caching DNS server (dnsmasq) is disabled from within the web GUI of ClarkConnect so that it does not start when the server boots.
  2. Download the RPM files from http://www.isc.org/index.pl?/sw/bind/. Use the link for Red Hat RPMs under Documents/References. Select RHEL-4 -> 9.3.2-4_EL4 -> i386 and download all the files to a temporary folder on your server.
  3. Update the existing components of ClarkConnect by issuing
    rpm -Fvh bind-libs-9.3.2-4_EL4.i386.rpm
    rpm -Fvh bind-utils-9.3.2-4_EL4.i386.rpm
    

    You can also put those two files in a directory and run “rpm -Fvh *.rpm”

  4. Put all other files except bind-sdb-9.3.2-4_EL4.i386.rpm in another temporary directory and issue the command “rpm -Fvh *.rpm” from within that directory.
  5. The installation will put a default configuration file at /etc/named.conf. Edit it so that it looks something like this (replace the domain for your domain)
    // Default named.conf generated by install of bind-9.3.1-1
    options {
            directory "/var/named";
            dump-file "/var/named/data/cache_dump.db";
            statistics-file "/var/named/data/named_stats.txt";
    };
    include "/etc/rndc.key";
    zone "example.com" in {
            file "master/example.com";
            type master;
            allow-transfer { any; };
    };
    
  6. Create a folder for primary DNS zones:
    mkdir /var/named/chroot/var/named/master
    
  7. Add a zone file for your domain. My file (/var/named/chroot/var/named/master/example.com) looks like this:
    $TTL 2d
    @               IN SOA          dns.example.com. postmaster.example.com. (
                                    2005082502      ; serial
                                    3h              ; refresh
                                    1h              ; retry
                                    2d              ; expiry
                                    1h )            ; minimum
    example.com.    IN NS           dns.example.com.
    example.com.    IN MX           10 mail.example.com.
    www             IN A            10.11.12.13
    mail            IN A            10.11.12.13
    dns             IN A            10.11.12.13
    
  8. After changing the zone file you should restart the DNS server by issuing “/etc/init.d/named restart”. Run “tail /var/log/messages” to make sure that the daemon could read your zone file correctly. Use nslookup from another computer to verify that the server can resolve names for the domain.
  9. Put a soft link in /etc/rc3.d to the file /etc/init.d/named to make the daemon start automatically when the server is booted
    ln -s /etc/init.d/named /etc/rc3.d/S12named
    

One reply on “Install Bind on ClarkConnect Home 3.1”

Wonderful entry, thank you!
I wonder if 4.3 will work the same. Also, there’s a precompiled bind package available via apt-get.
Why one needs to put “all other files except bind-sdb-9.3.2-4_EL4.i386.rpm in another temporary directory?”

Thank you,
Aladdin

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