Room for More in BIND DNS Release

Though the Domain Name Service that translates domain names into IP addresses, has been in use for 25 years, there is always room for it to improve.

The same is true for BIND (Berkeley Internet Name Domain), which has been around since 1985 and is widely considered the pre-eminent DNS server.

With the release of BIND 9.5 this week, the open source DNS server takes another step forward with new statistics, improved ActiveDirectory support and support for DHCID (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol Information).

The improvements suggest that innovation in DNS marches on, as well as timing. The latest BIND 9.5 follows the BIND 9.4 release by nearly 15 months. Before that, the release between previous versions took about three years.

"We're getting better at release engineering, and we've expanded our engineering staff," ISC president Paul Vixie explained to InternetNews.com. "BIND 9.5 also included several features that were funded through software development contracts, which had specific deadlines."

The Internet Systems Consortium (ISC), oversees the development of BIND and offers commercial support services for it. Among the key improvements in BIND 9.5 is support for DNS within Microsoft's ActiveDirectory. Vixie explained that a user can now use Microsoft clients without a Microsoft ActiveDirectory system, and still get secure dynamic DNS updates through their DHCP (define) service.

"So, anyone with a large Microsoft Windows deployment who wants to use an open source dynamic DNS server for it can finally do so," Vixie said.

BIND 9.5 also provides support for an emerging standard known as DHCID (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol Information).

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