1522 - Creating entries in a sub zone in NIOS

Scenario

A request ticket was submitted to create an A record and a PTR record for the FQDN ace.sales.techblue.net with the IPv4 address 10.200.0.199. Please verify that there are no duplicate entries and then add the appropriate records. After creation, verify the correct entries are added.

Estimate Completion Time

• 15 to 30 minutes

Credentials

Requirements

• Read-write access to DNS records

Course References

• 1007: Managing NIOS DNS Resource Records

• 1008: Using NIOS IPAM and Global Search

Lab Initiation

Access jump-desktop

Once the lab is deployed, you can access the virtual machines required to complete this lab activity. To initiate the lab, click on the jump-desktop tile and login to the Linux UI:

Username: training

Password: infoblox

Initiate lab

To initiate the lab, double-click the Launch Lab icon on the Desktop.

Choose the lab number from the list and click OK.

After clicking OK, you will see a pop-up message with a brief description of the lab task. If the description looks correct, click Yes to continue lab initiation.

Lab initiation will take a couple of minutes to finish.

Once complete, you will see another pop-up message with the login credentials and the URL for the Grid Manager’s User Interface. Note that the credentials may differ from those from prior labs.

Tasks

Task 1: Searching for existing entries

Login to the GM web interface. and use the search function to ensure that the requested name ace.sales.techblue.net is not already in use by another A record. Perform the same search for the IPv4 address 10.200.0.199 and its PTR record.

Task 2: Creating the entries

Create A and PTR records for the name ace.sales.techblue.net with the IPv4 address 10.200.0.199.

Task 3: Verifying object creation in GM

Navigate through the user interface to verify correct A and PTR records are created

Solutions

Task 1 Solution: Searching for existing entries 

Values mentioned in the task can be associated with more than one object in NIOS. For example, the same FQDN can be in multiple DNS views, the same IP address could be in different network views, etc. To gain a clear understanding of the object that you are about to create, it is always a good practice to search for these values before the actual object creation.

1. Login to NIOS GM web interface

2. Navigate to Global Search → Advanced. Provide ace.sales.techblue.net as a search string then click Search for Type equals All
   

   

3. Here we see no information, hence the FQDN is not present in NIOS database.

   

4. Repeat the steps for IP address 10.200.0.99 to rule out any duplicates.

Task 2 Solution: Creating the entries

Since there are no duplicate objects, we can now create the requested objects. In our sample grid, the reverse-mapping zone 200.10.in-addr.arpa already exists. Therefore, we can use the option Create associated PTR record to automatically create reverse-mapping records along with our forward-mapping A records. To create the records:

1. Navigate to Data Management →  DNS →  Toolbar →  Add →  Record → A Record
   

   

2. In the Add A Record > Step 1 of 3 window, click the Select Zone button
   

   

3. This opens the Zone Selector

4. Locate and click sales.techblue.net
   

   

5. Once the zone is selected, we can go back to Add A Record > Step 1 of 3 and fill in the Name as ace and IP Address as 10.200.0.199

6. Also, make sure to check the box for Create associated PTR record
   

   

7. Click Save & Close

Task 3 Solution: Verifying object creation on the GM

Once the records are created, we can navigate to the forward mapping and reverse mapping zones to find the A Record and the PTR record respectively

1. Navigate to Data Management → DNS → Zones

2. Click techblue.net to enter the zone

   

3. Once inside the zone, switch to subzones tab and click sales.techblue.net to go inside the zone

   

4. Inside the sales.techblue.net zone, switch to the Records tab and locate the A Record for ace
   

   

5. Navigate back out to Data Management → DNS → Zones and click 200.10.in-addr.arpa reverse-mapping zone to enter the zone

   

6. Once inside the zone, switch to the Records tab and locate the PTR Record for ace.sales.techblue.net