Compatibility with Previous Versions of BIND

This section provides the BIND 9.2.0 compatibility information.

BIND 4.9.7 Compatibility

This section discusses the BIND 9.2.0-BIND 4.9.7 compatibility.

BIND 9.2.0 uses a system assigned port for the UDP queries it makes rather than port 53 that BIND 4.9.7 uses. This may conflict with some firewalls. To specify a port, edit the /etc/named.conf file as follows:
query-source address * port 53; transfer-source * port 53; notify-source * port 53;
BIND 9.2.0 no longer uses the minimum field to specify the TTL of records without a explicit TTL.
Use the $TTL directive to specify a default TTL before the first record without an explicit TTL. The hosts_to_named script will create TTL value in the db files.
BIND 9.2.0 does not support multiple CNAMEs with the same owner name. For example:
www.example.com. CNAME host1.example.com. www.example.com. CNAME host2.example.com.
In the above example, multiple records with the same owner name “www.example.com” are not supported.
The named-checkzone program can be used to check the correctness of the database files.
BIND 9.2.0 does not support "CNAMEs with other data" with the same owner name, ignoring the DNSSEC records (SIG, NXT, KEY) that BIND 4.9.7 did not support. For example:
www.example.com. CNAME host1.example.com. www.example.com. MX 10 host2.example.com.
BIND 9.2.0 is less tolerant of errors in master files, so check your logs and fix any errors reported. The named-checkzone program can also be to check master files.
Outgoing zone transfers now use the "many-answers" format by default.This format is not understood by certain old versions of BIND 4.9.7.This problem can be resolved by using the option "transfer-format one-answer;", but HP recommends upgrading the slave servers.

BIND 8.1.2 Compatibility

This section discusses the BIND 9.2.0-BIND 8.1.2 compatibility.

Configuration file compatibility
- BIND 9.2.0 supports most of the options in named.conf file of BIND 8.1.2. BIND 9.2.0 issues a log message if the specified option is not implemented. It also logs the information if the default value is changed.
- In BIND 9.2.0, named refuses to start if it detects an error in named.conf. Earlier versions would start despite errors, causing the server to run with a partial configuration.
- In BIND 9.2.0, the " logging" statement only takes effect after the entire named.conf file has been read. In BIND 8.1.2, the new logging configuration took effect immediately after a "logging" statement was read.
- The source address and port for notify messages and refresh queries is now controlled by " notify-source" and "transfer-source", respectively, as against query-source in BIND 8.1.2.
Zone file compatibility
- BIND 9.2.0 does not support serial numbers of SOA record with an embedded period, like "3.002". Serial numbers should be integers.
- TXT records with unbalanced quotes, like ‘host TXT "foo’, were not treated as errors in previous versions of BIND. If the zone files contain such records, then error messages like "unexpected end of file"will be displayed because BIND 9.2.0 will interpret everything up to the next quote character as a literal string.
- Previous versions of BIND accept RRs containing line breaks that are not properly quoted with parentheses. This is not legal master file syntax and will be treated as an error by BIND 9.2.0.

Compatibility with Previous Versions of BIND

Technical documentation

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BIND 4.9.7 Compatibility

BIND 8.1.2 Compatibility