DNS resolver - speeding it up, newbie question.

[Paul Howarth]

Barry (BJEast75) wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I'm VERY new to Linux and need some very simple help here. I have turned on the named service on my linux box (hidden in the loft) that mainly sits there being my DNS server and being the a little file server for my home files that me and my girlfriends pc need acess to (thanks to Samba). 
> 
> All the other pc's in the house use it as their DNS server but the initial requests seem a tad slow compared to using my ISP's dns servers. I suspect that I could turn off a lot of the features/files/settings as all I need it to do is resolve  google.co.uk/bbc.co.uk/blah blah blah.co.uk   so on and so forth. I've tried some tutorials but they seem to be aimed at setting us a DNS server in a way that they are the gate wyat to servers and websites in the network that they're in front of (I hope I've explained whatI mean ok). Please DO NOT assume I know where to find these things or how to do it so any advice needs to be letter for letter.

This may be because the ISP DNS servers are used by lots of people and 
quickly build up a cache of the most popular names, so the chances are 
that any given lookup that you request can be satisfied straight away 
from cache. On the other hand, your DNS server is used only by the 
people in your house, so it has to go out and find the answers to your 
queries as and when you make the queries. Things should improve when the 
system has been running for a while and built up a cache, though it's 
still not going to be as good a cache as an ISP server. However, I find 
that running my own DNS server is rather more reliable than those of 
most ISPs I've been with, so I live with it.

What sort of delays are you seeing by the way?

You might want to try something like:

$ dig www.google.com +trace

to see the chain of DNS lookups for a name (www.google.com in this 
case), which may indicate where delays are occurring.

Paul.