Re: Another Crazy DNS Question... ;-)

[William T Wilson <fluffy@snurgle.org>]

On Thu, 4 Nov 1999, Bob Nielsen wrote:

> > Yes, you can point A records from two domains to the same IP address.
> 
> You can also use a CNAME record.  I'm not sure when one approach would
> be preferred over the other.

The answer is simple: Use A records for everything and forget about
CNAMEs. :}

I use a CNAME when a machine is supposed to have multiple names for the
same purpose.  For example, if your machine is "www.foo.com" and you also
want it to be "www.department.foo.com" then use a CNAME.  But if your
machine is "mail.foo.com" and you also want it to be "mail.bar.com" then
use an A record, because foo.com and bar.com are not the same entity.

Another way to look at it is to use CNAME for aliases to a machine.  For
example, if your organization mandates stupid names for machines like
"tor-fde1" and you want the machine to also have a name that people can
remember, then you could also call the machine "teddybear" and use a CNAME
for that.  Then, if tor-fde1 changes IP addresses, teddybear goes with it.