Panther Server 10.3.9 DNS quits just after starting up

[afterhours]

OSXS 10.3.9 on an Xserve. When starting (attempting to start) DNS services to test a mail problem, the DNS server will start up, then quit without notification. The dot adjacent to the DNS in the Server Admin services column turns green (stop server button appears above) for about 20 seconds, then goes back to clear. Nothing (and I mean NOTHING) is written to the named log in debug mode.

Any idea on what’s hosed or what am I overlooking? Thanks!

[afterhours]

What, like actually provide data? 🙂 Musta been asleep with the last post — thx joel.

Here’s an entry from the system.log:

Nov 3 15:27:59 mail named[20018]: starting BIND 9.2.2
Nov 3 15:27:59 mail named[20018]: using 1 CPU
Nov 3 15:27:59 mail named[20018]: loading configuration from ‘/private/etc/named.conf’
Nov 3 15:27:59 mail named[20018]: /private/etc/named.conf:34: expected IP address near ‘ns1.customerdomain.com’
Nov 3 15:27:59 mail named[20018]: loading configuration: unexpected token
Nov 3 15:27:59 mail named[20018]: exiting (due to fatal error)

Does DNS require IP addresses rather than server names (for the master name server)?

I suspect the best solution may be to wipe this machine and start from scratch. I do not have a reliable history on what the owner has done to date, ‘though he’s not a moron, so I can’t see how he’s screwed the pooch so badly I can’t repair it. But there’s enough in this box going wrong at once that I’m not certain where I should start.

Also, creating users and smtp is misbehaving (I have posted that separately). In fact, this server doesn’t even need to run DNS — that is already handled by dedicated name servers. We tried to turn on DNS while troubleshooting other components that are failing to work properly — this is a tangental item at present.

But it brings up another question: Does OSXS rely on its own DNS server internally for SMTP to function properly?

I’ll replace the name server with the appropriate IP in the DNS Zone Settings window to see if we have a state change.

Thx.

[Author]

Posts