HP-11/DIG

NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

The usual simple use of dig will take the form:

       dig @server domain query-type query-class

where:

server

may be either a domain name or a dot-notation Internet address. If this optional field is omitted, dig will attempt to use the default name server for your machine.

Note: If a domain name is specified, this will be resolved using the domain name system resolver (i.e., BIND). If your system does not support DNS, you may have to specify a dot-notation address. Alternatively, if there is a server at your disposal somewhere, all that is required is that /etc/resolv.conf be present and indicate where the default name servers reside, so that server itself can be resolved. See resolver(5) for information on /etc/resolv.conf. (WARNING: Changing /etc/resolv.conf will affect the standard resolver library and potentially several programs which use it.) As an option, the user may set the environment variable LOCALRES to name a file which is to be used instead of /etc/resolv.conf (LOCALRES is specific to the dig resolver and not referenced by the standard resolver). If the LOCALRES variable is not set or the file is not readable then /etc/resolv.conf will be used.

domain

is the domain name for which you are requesting information. See OPTIONS [-x] for convenient way to specify inverse address query.

query-type

is the type of information (DNS query type) that you are requesting. If omitted, the default is "a" (T_A = address). The following types are recognized:

a      T_A      network address
any    T_ANY    all/any information about specified domain
mx     T_MX     mail exchanger for the domain
ns     T_NS     name servers
soa    T_SOA    zone of authority record
hinfo  T_HINFO  host information
axfr   T_AXFR   zone transfer
                 (must ask an authoritative server)
txt    T_TXT    arbitrary number of strings
                 (not yet supported by BIND)

(See RFC 1035 for the complete list.)

query-class

is the network class requested in the query. If omitted, the default is "in" (C_IN = Internet). The following classes are recognized:

in     C_IN     Internet class domain
any    C_ANY    all/any class information

(See RFC 1035 for the complete list.)

Note: "Any" can be used to specify a class and/or a type of query. Dig will parse the first occurrence of "any" to mean query-type = T_ANY. To specify query-class = C_ANY you must either specify "any" twice, or set query-class using "-c" option (see below).

OTHER OPTIONS

%ignored-comment

"%" is used to included an argument that is simply not parsed. This may be useful if running dig in batch mode. Instead of resolving every @server-domain-name in a list of queries, you can avoid the overhead of doing so, and still have the domain name on the command line as a reference. Example:

      dig @128.9.0.32 %venera.isi.edu mx isi.edu

-<dig option>

"-" is used to specify an option which effects the operation of dig. The following options are currently available (although not guaranteed to be useful):

-x dot-notation-address

Convenient form to specify inverse address mapping. Instead of "dig 32.0.9.128.in-addr.arpa" one can simply "dig -x 128.9.0.32".

-f file

File for dig batch mode. The file contains a list of query specifications (dig command lines) which are to be executed successively. Lines beginning with ';', '#', or '\n' are ignored. Other options may still appear on command line, and will be in effect for each batch query.

-T time

Time in seconds between start of successive queries when running in batch mode. Can be used to keep two or more batch dig commands running roughly in sync. Default is zero.

-p port

Port number. Query a name server listening to a non-standard port number. Default is 53.

-P[ping-string]

After query returns, execute a ping(8) command for response time comparison. This rather unelegantly makes a call to the shell. The last three lines of statistics is printed for the command:

      ping -s server_name 56 3

If the optional "ping string" is present, it replaces "ping -s" in the shell command.

-t query-type

Specify type of query. May specify either an integer value to be included in the type field or use the abbreviated mnemonic as discussed above (i.e., mx = T_MX).

-c query-class

Specify class of query. May specify either an integer value to be included in the class field or use the abbreviated mnemonic as discussed above (i.e., in = C_IN).

-envsav

This flag specifies that the dig environment (defaults, print options, etc.), after all of the arguments are parsed, should be saved to a file to become the default environment. Useful if you do not like the standard set of defaults and do not desire to include a large number of options each time dig is used. The environment consists of resolver state variable flags, timeout, and retries as well as the flags detailing dig output (see below). If the shell environment variable LOCALDEF is set to the name of a file, this is where the default dig environment is saved. If not, the file "DiG.env" is created in the current working directory.

Note: LOCALDEF is specific to the dig resolver, and will not affect operation of the standard resolver library.

Each time dig is executed, it looks for "./DiG.env" or the file specified by the shell environment variable LOCALDEF. If such file exists and is readable, then the environment is restored from this file before any arguments are parsed.

-envset

This flag only affects batch query runs. When "-envset" is specified on a line in a dig batch file, the dig environment after the arguments are parsed, becomes the default environment for the duration of the batch file, or until the next line which specifies "-envset".

-[no]stick

This flag only affects batch query runs. It specifies that the dig environment (as read initially or set by "-envset" switch) is to be restored before each query (line) in a dig batch file. The default "-nostick" means that the dig environment does not stick, hence options specified on a single line in a dig batch file will remain in effect for subsequent lines (i.e. they are not restored to the "sticky" default).

+<query option>

"+" is used to specify an option to be changed in the query packet or to change dig output specifics. Many of these are the same parameters accepted by nslookup(1). If an option requires a parameter, the form is as follows:

      +keyword[=value]

Most keywords can be abbreviated. Parsing of the "+" options is very simplistic --- a value must not be separated from its keyword by white space. The following keywords are currently available:

Keyword      Abbrev. Meaning [default]

[no]debug    (deb)   turn on/off debugging mode [deb]
[no]d2               turn on/off extra debugging mode [nod2]
[no]recurse  (rec)   use/don't use recursive lookup [rec]
retry=#      (ret)   set number of retries to # [4]
time=#       (ti)    set timeout length to # seconds [4]
[no]ko               keep open option (implies vc) [noko]
[no]vc               use/don't use virtual circuit [novc]
[no]defname  (def)   use/don't use default domain name [def]
[no]search   (sea)   use/don't use domain search list [sea]
domain=NAME  (do)    set default domain name to NAME
[no]ignore   (i)     ignore/don't ignore trunc. errors [noi]
[no]primary  (pr)     use/don't use primary server [nopr]
[no]aaonly   (aa)    authoritative query only flag [noaa]
[no]sort     (sor)   sort resource records [nosor]
[no]cmd              echo parsed arguments [cmd]
[no]stats    (st)    print query statistics (RTT,etc) [st]
[no]Header   (H)     print basic header [H]
[no]header   (he)    print header flags [he]
[no]ttlid    (tt)    print TTLs [tt]
[no]cl               print class info [nocl]
[no]qr               print outgoing query [noqr]
[no]reply    (rep)   print reply [rep]
[no]ques     (qu)    print question section [qu]
[no]answer   (an)    print answer section [an]
[no]author   (au)    print authoritative section [au]
[no]addit    (ad)    print additional section [ad]
pfdef                set to default print flags
pfmin                set to minimal default print flags
pfset=#              set print flags to #
                     (# can be hex/octal/decimal)
pfand=#              bitwise and print flags with #
pfor=#               bitwise or print flags with #

The retry and time options affect the retransmission strategy used by resolver library when sending datagram queries. The algorithm is as follows:

for i = 0 to retry - 1
    for j = 1 to num_servers
             send_query
             wait((time * (2**i)) / num_servers)
    end
end

(Note: dig always uses a value of 1 for num_servers.)

Pfset, pfand, and pfor were included to make manipulation of the various print options less tedious. Below are the currently defined meanings for the various print flag bits. They may be combined (ANDed) to achieve various output formats.

PRF_STATS  0x0001  RTT, query & server host, date, msg size
PRF_CLASS  0x0004  Resource record class information
PRF_CMD    0x0008  dig command line echo
PRF_QUES   0x0010  questions section
PRF_ANS    0x0020  answers section
PRF_AUTH   0x0040  authoritative section
PRF_ADD    0x0080  additional records section
PRF_HEAD1  0x0100  RR section headers & counts
PRF_HEAD2  0x0200  pkt header flags
PRF_TTLID  0x0400  Resource record ttl
PRF_HEADX  0x0800  basic header
PRF_QUERY  0x1000  outgoing query packet
PRF_REPLY  0x2000  reply packet
PRF_SORT   0x8000  sort various response sections
PRF_DEF    0x2ff9  default dig settings
PRF_ZONE   0x24f9  default setting for zone transfer
PRF_MIN    0xa930  minimalistic dig settings for
                   (future) automated server testing

When setting the print options, if you want to see information other than statistics, you should choose to examine the outgoing (0x1000), incoming (0x2000), or both packets plus the specific sections of the packet you are interested in.

DETAILS

FILES

ENVIRONMENT

AUTHOR

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

BUGS

Dig does not consistently exit nicely (with appropriate status) when a problem occurs somewhere in the resolver (NOTE: most of the common exit cases are handled). This is particularly annoying when running in batch mode. If it exits abnormally (and is not caught), the entire batch aborts; when such an event is trapped, dig simply continues with the next query.  

SEE ALSO