Essential Network Servers

Hardware

netgod: master source of all network configuration information.
netslave1: BOOTP server for Clayton and small campuses. DNS server for Clayton and small campuses.
netslave2: BOOTP server for Clayton and small campuses. DNS forwarder (super-cache) for all other DNS servers.
netslave3: BOOTP and DNS server for Gippsland and Moe campuses.
netslave4: BOOTP and DNS server for Caulfield campus.
netslave5: BOOTP and DNS server for Peninsula campus.
netslave6: BOOTP and DNS server for VCP campus.
netslave7: BOOTP and DNS server for Berwick campus.

netgod is a DEC 3000/700. The netslaves are DEC 3000/300LX's.

Software

The software on these machines has been configured to make them as robust as possible.

All the ENS machines run without any NFS mounts.
All ENS machines can boot and commence operation without being connected to an operational network.
The netslaves do the absolute minimum of logging to disk, all syslogs are redirected to netgod.
The netslaves do not accept incoming Email.
The netslaves are not meant to support any interactive users at all.

DNS and BOOTP Service

Periodically, netgod extracts information from the addhost database on the addhost machine (currently "old-mother").

The database extract is massaged into a master Monash bootptab file which is the rdist'ed to all the netslaves which then serve all the users' BOOTP requests.

The database extract is also massaged into DNS forward and reverse zone files. The DNS server on netgod is reloaded to learn the new information. It then uses the DNS protocol to distribute updated DNS zone information to all the netslaves.

The DNS server on netgod also fetches a few other DNS zones from other DNS servers and distributes them to the netslaves. The DNS server on netgod isn't meant to be used to service user DNS requests, only zone transfers to and from other DNS servers.

The DNS servers on the netslaves are meant to be serving all user DNS requests, and not to be used for zone transfers. The DNS servers on the netslaves don't fetch DNS zones from anywhere other than netgod.

Further Information

See the DNS Requests For Comments (RFC), and the "BIND Operations Guide".