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DIG (Domain Information
Groper) is an Advanced DNS tool. It retrieves all of
the available DNS Resource Records (RR) for a given host or domain.
The Results
The information that you get from a Dig will vary from
server to server. some of the information available is:
 | SOA: Start of Authority, Record which gives the
information for the name server for the zone.
 | Name: Name of the zone |
| Origin: Server name |
| Responsible Person: E-mail address for the
party responsible for maintaining the DNS records |
| Serial number: Version of the SOA data.
Convention is YYMMDD |
| Refresh: How frequently (in seconds) that a secondary name server
verifies the version of its data file with the primary
name server. |
| Retry: How long (in seconds) a secondary server should wait
if the first refresh attempt fails. |
| Expire: How long (in seconds) that a secondary name server
can give out data without being able to contact the primary name server
for a refresh. |
| Minimum: Time-to-live value (in
seconds) for DNS records. How long the DNS records are retained by a
remote server before it requests the information again.
| NS: Name Server, Identifies domain's primary and
secondary name servers.
| A: Address, associates the name on the left with its IP
address
| PTR: Pointer, associates the IP address with the name
server on the right
| MX: Mail Exchanger, Specifies what system receives e-mail
for a given domain name.
| CNAME: Canonical Name, Defines host aliases, e.g., a
domain's mailhost may be called mserver1. CNAME would associate mailhost
with that name.
| WKS: Well Known Service description.
Provides information about the services carried on the host. Rarely used
due to security issues.
| HINFO: Host information.
Provides system hardware and operating system information. Rarely used
due to security issues.
| MINFO: Information regarding mail lists
| TXT: text strings
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Dig can be used to obtain more information about an IP
address or a domain name. It is useful in verifying name servers and
mailserver names, can provide locations and other IP addresses associated with a
system.
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