basic guide to dns - google

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Basic Guide to DNS

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This is a list of common terms that you'll encounter when managing a domain. Click a term below to jump to thedescription of the term, and its practical use with Google Apps.

Since registrars, hosts, and record configurations vary, this is a basic guide to DNS.

DNSDomain NameDomain Registrar Top Level Domain

Second-level DomainThird-level DomainDomain HostA RecordNS RecordMX RecordCNAME RecordIP AddressCustom URLsDomain AliasWHOIS directory

DNS

DNS stands for Domain Name System. This system is in place to organize and identify domains. Essentially, DNSprovides a name for a domain's one or more IP addresses. For instance, the domain name wolf.example.commight translate to 198.102.434.8. This makes it much easier to remember URLs and email addresses.

DNS is also used to find out where to deliver email for a particular address. This is done with MX Records .

You need to have a registered domain name to use Google Apps.

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Domain Name

Domain names are easy-to-remember names (URLs and email addresses) that are associated with one or more IPaddresses. Since a web page is defined by its URL, the page can move to a different IP address without affectingvisitors.

Example: www.singlespeed.com

singlespeed.com is the domain name.com is the top level domain .singlespeed is a subdivision of com, and represents the second-level domain .www is a subdomain (also known as third-level domain or CNAME).

The whole domain name can not exceed a total length of 255 characters, but some registries have shorter limits.

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Google Apps Administrator Help

c Guide to DNS - Google Apps Help http://www.google.com/support/a/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=48090#K

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Domain Registrar

Domain registrars sell Internet domain names (ex. blueshirt.com or organicfood.org ). Most of these companiesoffer a hosting service in addition to registration.

If your domain registrar is separate from your domain host, you'll need to add the host's name servers to your registrar's account. For example, if you purchase a domain name from namecheap.com (which offers domainregistration) and host your domain with DynDNS (which offers domain hosting), you'll add the name servers of DynDNS ( ns1.mydyndns.org and ns2.mydyndns.org ) to your account with namecheap.com.

Google Apps offers domain registration with a select group of domain registration partners. This allows you topurchase a domain name and sign up for Google Apps at the same time. If you purchase a domain name whilesigning up, Google will auto-configure services for your domain so that you won't need to manually configure MXand CNAME records.

If you purchased your domain name before signing up for Google Apps, visit our list of domain hosts (some of which are also domain registrars) that have instructions for modifying MX records in our Help Center.

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Top Level Domain

Top-level domains are the last part of a domain name - the letters after the last period. Some examples are: biz com org edu us ca fr de travel local es pl

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Second-level Domain

Second-level domains are directly below top-level domains. Some current examples are:

Second-level Domain Domain Name

Google google.com

Wikipedia wikipedia.org

Ontariotravel ontariotravel.com

Craigslist craigslist.com

louvre louvre.fr

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Third-level Domain

Third-level domains are also known as subdomains and CNAMEs. In a URL, the subdomain is written before thedomain name. Here's some examples:

Subdomain URL

affiliates http://affiliates.art.com

www http://www.rockfound.org

men http://men.style.com

mail http://mail.google.com

bus http://www.bus.umich.edu

To set up web publishing with Google Apps, you'll need to pick a subdomain as your web publishing address.


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Lookup

Enter domain name

Example result (showing that email for mightydinosaur.com is directed to Google ):

mightydinosaur.com mail exchanger = 10 aspmx.l.google.com. back to top

CNAME Record

Canonical name records are aliases for A records. For each CNAME record, you can choose an alias and a host.

To set up web publishing with Google Apps, you can pick an address for your web pages. The third-level domain of the address is the alias and ghs.google.com is the host.

If you'd like to check the status of your CNAME record for web publishing, you can perform a free CNAME lookup.

Here's how:

Visit Google.com.1.Search for NS lookup .2.Select a search result from the list.3.Type your web publishing address in to the field.4.Select CNAME record if it's not the default search query.5.Click Submit , or Lookup .6.

Example result (showing that the subdomain of start.mightydinosaur.com is pointing to ghs.google.com ):

DNS Lookup (CNAME) for start.mightydinosaur.com . Items Returned: 1

ghs.google.com

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IP Address

Internet Protocol addresses are unique numbers that allow devices to locate information on a network.

Since a domain name may have one or more associated IP addresses, Google Apps doesn't support email andweb publishing configuration using IP addresses alone.

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Custom URLs

Custom URLs, or short URLs, make using the Internet easier. A custom URL allows you and your users to accessthe login page for services at your domain with a simple, easy-to-remember address. With Google Apps, your custom URLs will follow this format:

http://[customize this section].your_domain.com

Instead of asking your users to visit http://www.google.com/calendar/a/your_domain.com to log in to their calendars, you can create a short, custom URL. Learn more

Calendar Examples

http://calendar.your_domain.com

http://c.your_domain.com

MX Record Lookup

By DNSstuff.com


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http://9-5.your_domain.com

http://myagenda.your_domain.com

http://where2go.your_domain.com

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Domain Alias

Domain name aliases are additional domain names associated with your primary domain. With Google Apps, youcan add a domain alias that receives mail and delivers it to mailboxes at your primary domain.

Some common uses:

Add a domain alias to cover other top-level domains. If your domain name is theurbanexperience.org , youmay want to alias theurbanexperience.com and theurbanexperience.us .Add a domain alias to help people who mistype your domain name. If your domain name istheurbanexperience.org , you may want to alias urbanexperience.org , theurbanexperiment.org , andurbanexperiences.org .

Add a domain alias to receive mail addressed to two separate domains in one mailbox. If you receive mail attwo domain names, such as [email protected] and [email protected] , you can aliasclarkston.com to bradford.com , and all mail sent to either address will be delivered [email protected] .

WHOIS directory

The WHOIS directory is a public listing of domain names, and people or organizations associated with each domainname.

As a privacy measure, some domain name owners prefer to have their personal information hidden from theWHOIS directory. This is similar to the way someone may want his/her personal telephone number unlisted in alocal telephone book.

The WHOIS directory is used to determine the owner of domain names and IP addresses. There are many freeweb-based directories available on the Internet. The information provided in the WHOIS directory includes a mailingaddress and a telephone number.

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