Linking to numberic IP addresses vs. alpha in URLS

[Michael Tibor]

On Thu, 28 Jan 1999 Stacy Pober wrote:

> At our library we have several databases (our catalog and some 
> periodical databases) supplied over an Extranet connection.  The 
> Extranet is intended to provide better performance and more stability 
> in our connection to these sites.  The problem is, when the Extranet is 
> up and the campus Internet connection is down, we aren't always able to 
> access the Extranet sites.  This is supposedly due to DNS failure 
> as there is no DNS server on the Extranet and our local DNS server does 
> not cache addresses.   (I say 'supposedly' because one of those sites 
> does not allow ping or tracert connections from the Extranet sites, and 
> the failure message isn't one that indicates DNS problems per se.)

Is there a firewall blocking DNS traffic (outgoing UDP packets on port
53)?  There really isn't any reason to block DNS traffic, so if that's the
case the firewall should be fixed.

Another possibility is that the desktops on that network aren't configured
to use any DNS servers.

A third possibility may be that the desktops are configured to use DNS
servers properly, and that DNS traffic is not being blocked by anything,
but that the DNS servers which the desktops are trying to use are either
down or otherwise unreachable.  If this is the case, it might be a good
idea to setup another DNS server, preferably as close to the desktops as
possible (network topology-wise).

A DNS server is a basic component of a TCP/IP network.  I can't think of
any reason why it would be better to devise a (probably overly complex) 
workaround.

Mike
-- 
Mike Tibor         Univ. of Alaska Anchorage    (907) 786-1001 voice
LAN Technician     Consortium Library             (907) 786-6050 fax
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