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Hello,

Maybe someone might be able to help me out with this. I have a Server 2008R2 server setup as a domain controller running ADDS, file services, and DNS. Lets call it SERVER1. I have a computer on the same network using the server’s IP address as it’s primary DNS server. Lets call it DESKTOP1.

I created an A record on SERVER1 pointing “helpdesk” to the server’s IP address. Lets say it’s 192.168.1.1 however DESKTOP1 is not able to resolve “helpdesk” to 192.168.1.1. It is able to resolve “SERVER1” to 192.168.1.1. I see the DNS record for SERVER1 pointing to 192.168.1.1 which works, and as far as I know I created the DNS record for “helpdesk” precisely the same way.

I would like users in this network to be able to type “helpdesk” into their browser to access our helpdesk without having to change SERVER1’s computer name. Can someone shed some light on this and tell me where I’m going wrong? Is the way the desktop resolving the computer name to IP address different than the way it would resolve “helpdesk” to an IP?

Thanks.

2 Spice ups
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What kind of web server is running on “helpdesk” aka SERVER1? You need to tell it (the http server) that it may respond to requests for “helpdesk” and where that site is located on the server.

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The problem is before it even gets to the web server. I’m unable to resolve “helpdesk” to an IP address from DESKTOP1 using the ping command. When I ping SERVER1 it resolves fine.

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What happens if you ping helpdesk’?

What happens if you ping ‘helpdesk.domain.local’?

1 Spice up
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What is the FQDN of helpdesk? If you have helpdesk.mydomain.com, mydomain.com needs to be either the connection specific domain on the NIC of DESKTOP1, or be listed as a search domain for the short name of “helpdesk” to be resolved to the FQDN of “helpdesk.mydomain.com”.

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You might also want to check your DHCP server and what search domains it’s handing out. Short names use the suffix search order defined in your TCP/IP settings.

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Does your organization use net bios?

Did you reload the zone after creating a new record? (right click zone, reload)

Did you flush the dns on the PC? (ipconfig /flushdns)

On the PC, using the results of ipconfig /all, do an “nslookup helpdesk ns1”, ns2, ns3, etc… where ns* = DNS server listed to ensure they all respond with the proper IP address. If any server doesn’t respond properly, you will want to check the DNS on that server, and possible reload the zone there. Also, if your adaptor has more than one DNS suffix listed, you want to ensure that the host name does not exist on any other domains you have listed (in the adaptor settings, ip4, advanced, DNS tab) otherwise you could have the issue where helpdesk.domain2.net is being resolved instead of helpdesk.domain1.net.

if all the DNS stuff checks out, you may want to ensure your helpdesk host is set to respond to web as helpdesk and server1. if it does not, you may want to use a CNAME record instead of an A record, or update the IIS (or whatever) http service to respond to both.

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I am able to ping the full domain name from DESKTOP1. So does this mean that all users will have to enter “helpdesk.domain.local” into their browsers or a change needs to be made on every user’s machine to set the connection specific domain on the nic? Why does “SERVER1” work without having to enter server1.domain.local?

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go to a client. Type:

nslookup

what server is it using? The server you want? if so, type:

helpdesk

at the prompt. Does it give you the address you were expecting?

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Yes it is using the server that I want. No helpdesk does not resolve, but helpdesk.domain.local does.

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If you do a “ipconfig /all” from DESKTOP1 post the command output here, or verify that the domain.local is listed under:

Primary DNS Suffix . . . . . . . : domain.local

DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : domain.local

If not you need to specify these in your DHCP server scope, or manually on DESKTOP1.

1 Spice up
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if the client computers are using DHCP, you may want to add the option for DNS suffix for the domain in question. THey may be option 15 and 119, if memory serves.

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Thanks. This is all I needed to know.

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From the ipconfig /all command on Desktop1 - what is your ‘Node Type’

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ok, so your dns suffix probably isn’t being added by your DHCP server.

To verify, do a:

ipconfig /all

look for the line “Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :”

What does it say?

To fix it, go to DHCP server admin console, add the scope option “015 DNS Domain Name”

set that to your internal domain name.

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If you can ping helpdesk.domain.local then that would suggest the suffix is different on your client machines, or not registered.

Are the machines you are pining this from in the same domain as helpdesk?

As others have suggested you can add domain suffix, but you shouldn’t need to if the client pcs are all in the same domain - domain registration does this for you