NiagaraAX and DNS

NiagaraAX and DNS

NiagaraAX supports DNS as an alternative to the HOSTS file, although the most reliable connectivity to other NiagaraAX hosts is provided through the use of a HOSTS file on each NiagaraAX station. With HOSTS files, there is no dependency on a remote DNS server for name resolution.

Many host operating systems (OSs), support DNS. Administrators configure the host to look up entries in one or more DNS servers. The host can be configured manually, or it can dynamically receive this setting with DHCP.

When a host tries to contact a particular name (for example, trying to browse www.bbc.co.uk), it first looks in the local HOSTS file, and upon finding no entry, checks with its name server. The name server either returns the information if it knows it, or contacts a root name server, which passes it the address of one of the name servers responsible for the .uk domain. Then that server returns the address of a second-level server handling co.uk, which returns the address of the bbc.co.uk server, which finally returns the IP address for the host named “www”. The browser uses the IP address to fetch the data to open the page.