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Version 84 PowerDNS enabled as default?

Spirogg
I have a question about this change to cPanel 84: PowerDNS installs by default on new installations As of cPanel & WHM version 84, the system enables the PowerDNS nameserver software on new installations of cPanel & WHM. For more information about PowerDNS, read our

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8 comments

Date Votes
  • ffeingol
    I have not seen any doc on the new PowerDNS config but here are my guesses: Most people won't care that it's not a cachehing DNS server. You are more than likely using your data centers caching DNS servers or Google (or CloudFlare). Just check if there are nameserver entries in your /etc/resolv.conf. If they are not 127.0.0.1 or your servers's IP, then you are using someone else's caching DNS servers. I'd also guess that they have PowerDNs setup to use bind configuration as a back end. PowerDNS can have a lot of different back ends (database, LDAP, BIND etc.). Since cpanel already has code to manage BIND format zone files it's kind of a no-brainier to simply configure PowerDNS to read the BIND format zone files. It makes no different to your name servers what software is running on the server. They will resolve/service up the same information. For customers with clustered DNS and lots (and lots) of zone files (like us) switching from BIND to PowerDNS is huge. BIND is very (very) slow to start up with lots of zone files. PowerDNS on the other hand is blazing fast. Time will tell how close my guesses are :-)
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  • Spirogg
    I have not seen any doc on the new PowerDNS config but here are my guesses: Most people won't care that it's not a cachehing DNS server. You are more than likely using your data centers caching DNS servers or Google (or CloudFlare). Just check if there are nameserver entries in your /etc/resolv.conf. If they are not 127.0.0.1 or your servers's IP, then you are using someone else's caching DNS servers. I'd also guess that they have PowerDNs setup to use bind configuration as a back end. PowerDNS can have a lot of different back ends (database, LDAP, BIND etc.). Since cpanel already has code to manage BIND format zone files it's kind of a no-brainier to simply configure PowerDNS to read the BIND format zone files. It makes no different to your name servers what software is running on the server. They will resolve/service up the same information. For customers with clustered DNS and lots (and lots) of zone files (like us) switching from BIND to PowerDNS is huge. BIND is very (very) slow to start up with lots of zone files. PowerDNS on the other hand is blazing fast. Time will tell how close my guesses are :)

    @ffeingol thank you for your response. I was just making sure If I do Make the change I won't have any propagation issues with my nameservers and all the domains will remain working :) Thanks again, Spiro
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  • Spirogg
    Configuring PowerDNS nameserver Installing and configuring PowerDNS... Conversion process will be logged to /var/cpanel/logs/setupnameserver. Setting name server to powerdns in /var/cpanel/cpanel.config Halting NSD Disabling NSD in init system Halting BIND Disabling BIND in init system Halting MyDNS Disabling MyDNS in init system Checking that PowerDNS is installed Calling RPM installer object [2019-10-07 22:03:04 -0500] Maximum sync children set to 16 based on 3009M available memory. [2019-10-07 22:03:04 -0500] Downloading http://httpupdate.cpanel.net/RPM/11.84/centos/7/x86_64/rpm.sha512 [2019-10-07 22:03:04 -0500] Successfully verified signature for cpanel (key types: release). [2019-10-07 22:03:04 -0500] Maximum sync children set to 16 based on 3005M available memory. [2019-10-07 22:03:04 -0500] Downloading http://httpupdate.cpanel.net/RPM/11.84/centos/7/x86_64/cpanel-pdns-4.1.10-1.cp1184.x86_64.rpm [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Acquiring lock for Cpanel::RPM::Versions::File [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Lock Acquired for Cpanel::RPM::Versions::File [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Disabling service monitoring. [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Hooks system enabled. [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Checking for and running RPM::Versions 'pre' hooks for any RPMs about to be installed [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] All required 'pre' hooks have been run [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] No RPMS need to be uninstalled [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Installing new rpms: cpanel-pdns-4.1.10-1.cp1184.x86_64.rpm [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] Preparing packages... [2019-10-07 22:03:06 -0500] cpanel-pdns-4.1.10-1.cp1184.x86_64 [2019-10-07 22:03:10 -0500] Releasing lock for Cpanel::RPM::Versions::File [2019-10-07 22:03:10 -0500] Hooks system enabled. [2019-10-07 22:03:10 -0500] Checking for and running RPM::Versions 'post' hooks for any RPMs about to be installed [2019-10-07 22:03:10 -0500] All required 'post' hooks have been run [2019-10-07 22:03:10 -0500] Restoring service monitoring. Enabling PowerDNS in init system Starting PowerDNS Waiting for "pdns" to start ""waiting for "pdns" to initialize "finished. Service Status pdns (/usr/sbin/pdns_server --guardian=no --daemon=no --disable-syslog --log-timestamp=no --write-pid=no) is running as named with PID 11483 (systemd+/proc check method). Startup Log Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: Using 64-bits mode. Built using gcc 4.8.2 20140120 (Red Hat 4.8.2-16) on Sep 4 2019 10:30:59 by root@rpmbuild-64-centos-7.dev.cpanel.net. Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: PowerDNS comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it according to the terms of the GPL version 2. Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: Creating backend connection for TCP Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Parsing 21 domain(s), will report when done Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Warning! Skipping zone '.' because type 'hint' is invalid Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Warning! Skipping zone '.' because type 'hint' is invalid Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Warning! Skipping zone '.' because type 'hint' is invalid Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Done parsing domains, 3 rejected, 12 new, 0 removed Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: Only asked for 1 backend thread - operating unthreaded Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com systemd[1]: Started PowerDNS Authoritative Server. pdns started successfully. Building global cache for cpanel...Done Nameserver conversion complete --------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Does this look Normal below, I only have 3 domains on this vps but shows parsing 21 domain(s) and also skipping zone because type "hint" is invalid ? and then the last line says Done Parsing domains, 3 rejected, 12 new, 0 removed ? so why does it say first 21 domains then 3 rejected and 12 New ? Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Parsing 21 domain(s), will report when done Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Warning! Skipping zone '.' because type 'hint' is invalid Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Warning! Skipping zone '.' because type 'hint' is invalid Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Warning! Skipping zone '.' because type 'hint' is invalid Oct 07 22:03:10 2.mydomain.com pdns_server[11483]: [bindbackend] Done parsing domains, 3 rejected, 12 new, 0 removed -----------------------------------------------------------
    domains are working and everything seems to work just not sure why it says: 21 domains 3 rejected, 12 new and type "hint" invalid ? Thanks again and sorry if these are dumb questions? i'm not a pro but learning Much Appreciated Regards, Spiro
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  • cPanelLauren
    A BIND hint zone is a specific zone_type: hint The initial set of root-servers is defined using a hint zone. When the server starts up it uses the hints zone file to find a root name server and get the most recent list of root name servers. If no hint zone is specified for class IN, the server uses a compiled-in default set of root servers. Classes other than IN have no built-in default hints.
    PDNS even with bind-backend doesn't use them per their docs " Bind backend now ignores "hint" and "forward" and other unsupported zone types.
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  • Spirogg
    How many domains are listed in the /etc/named.conf?
    Hi @cPanelLauren , There are only 3 actual domains, It also has the hostname and ns1 ns2 So if I added 3 domains nameservers and hostname would be 6 if not it's just 3 domains Thanks for your reply and help in advance Spiro
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  • Spirogg
    @cPanelLauren PS I'm running a VPS - Cloud 2Vcpu 4 GB ram CentOS 7 Thanks again for you help Spiro
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  • cPanelLauren
    PowerDNS is counting/parsing the domains present, which is why I suggested you check the named.conf but you can also more than likely count all files in /var/named
    and get the domains. The rejected zones would be the root hint zones though they'd be included in the total. You could run something like: pdns_control bind-domain-status
    to see domains it parsed or pdns_control list-zones
    which will give a zone count at the end You might also want to check out the pdns documentation here: pdns_control " PowerDNS Authoritative Server documentation
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  • Spirogg
    ok thanks all good now
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