SRV record

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A Service record (SRV record) is a specification of data in the Domain Name System defining the location, i.e., the hostname and port number, of servers for specified services. It is defined in RFC 2782, and its type code is 33. Some Internet protocols such as the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) and the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) often require SRV support by network elements.

Contents

Record format

A SRV record has the form:

_service._proto.name. ttl IN SRV priority weight port target.

An example SRV record in textual form that might be found in a zone file might be the following:

_sip._tcp.example.com.86400INSRV055060sipserver.example.com.

This points to a server named sipserver.example.com listening on TCP port 5060 for Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) protocol services. The priority given here is 0, and the weight is 5.

As in MX records, the target in SRV records must point to hostname with an address record (A or AAAA record). Pointing to a hostname with a CNAME record is not a valid configuration. [1]

Provisioning for high service availability

The priority field determines the precedence of the use of the record's data. Clients should use the SRV records with the lowest-numbered priority value first, and fall back to records of higher value if the connection fails. If a service has multiple SRV records with the same priority value, clients should load balance them in proportion to the values of their weight fields. In the following example, both the priority and weight fields are used to provide a combination of load balancing and backup service. 

; _service._proto.name.  TTL   class SRV priority weight port target._sip._tcp.example.com.86400INSRV10605060bigbox.example.com._sip._tcp.example.com.86400INSRV10205060smallbox1.example.com._sip._tcp.example.com.86400INSRV10205060smallbox2.example.com._sip._tcp.example.com.86400INSRV2005060backupbox.example.com.

The first three records share a priority of 10, so the weight field's value will be used by clients to determine which server (host and port combination) to contact. The sum of all three values is 100, so bigbox.example.com will be used 60% of the time. The two hosts, smallbox1 and smallbox2 will be used for 40% of requests total, with half of them sent to smallbox1, and the other half to smallbox2. If bigbox is unavailable, these two remaining machines will share the load equally, since they will each be selected 50% of the time.

If all three servers with priority 10 are unavailable, the record with the next lowest priority value will be chosen, which is backupbox.example.com. This might be a machine in another physical location, presumably not vulnerable to anything that would cause the first three hosts to become unavailable.

The load balancing provided by SRV records is inherently limited since the information is essentially static. The current load of servers is not taken into account unless TTL values are low enough (around a minute or lower) that the priority (or weight) values can be quickly updated.

Usage

SRV records are common in conjunction with the following standardized communications protocols:[ clarification needed ]

In Microsoft Windows 2000 clients query for SRV records to determine the domain controller for a given service. SRV records are also used by Outlook 2007, 2010 and Macintosh 10.6 mail to locate the Exchange Autodiscover service. [20] In Microsoft Windows networks domain controllers register their network service types for Active Directory in the DNS.

An older version of the Internet Draft for OpenPGP Web Key Directory uses SRV records for discovering OpenPGP keys through web servers. [21] Usages of SRV records are no longer part of the Internet Draft in later versions. [22]

A registry of service names for SRV records & protocols is maintained by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) as defined in RFC 6335. [23]

See also

Related Research Articles

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References

  1. ↑ Gulbrandsen, A.; Vixie, P.; Esibov, L. (February 2000). "The format of the SRV RR". A DNS RR for specifying the location of services (DNS SRV). doi: 10.17487/RFC2782 . RFC 2782 . Retrieved 3 December 2021. There MUST be one or more address records for this name, the name MUST NOT be an alias (in the sense of RFC 1034 or RFC 2181).
  2. ↑ "DNS SRV record support in apt". Debian. 4 May 2018. Archived from the original on 17 November 2019. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
  3. ↑ "RFC6764: Locating Services for Calendaring Extensions to WebDAV (CalDAV) and vCard Extensions to WebDAV (CardDAV)".
  4. ↑ "Looking up Monitors through DNS – Ceph Documentation". Ceph Documentation. Archived from the original on 5 December 2017. Retrieved 4 December 2017.
  5. ↑ "Version 1.1.62 - Factorio Forums". Factorio Forum. Archived from the original on 16 September 2022. Retrieved 16 September 2022.
  6. ↑ "Version 1.1.67 - Factorio Forums". Factorio Forum. Archived from the original on 20 August 2022. Retrieved 16 September 2022.
  7. ↑ "Add SRV Record support - Page 4 - Factorio Forums". Factorio Forum. Archived from the original on 16 September 2022. Retrieved 16 September 2022.
  8. ↑ "Hostnames for the Master and Slave KDCs". Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Archived from the original on 21 October 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012.
  9. ↑ Zeilenga, K. (April 2001). OpenLDAP Root Service - An experimental LDAP referral service. IETF. doi: 10.17487/RFC3088 . RFC 3088. Archived from the original on 16 January 2020. Retrieved 5 July 2020.
  10. ↑ Daboo, C. (March 2011). Use of SRV Records for Locating Email Submission/Access Services. IETF. doi: 10.17487/RFC6186 . RFC 6186. Archived from the original on 17 April 2013. Retrieved 17 April 2013.
  11. ↑ "Federation API". Matrix.org. Archived from the original on 5 July 2020. Retrieved 5 January 2018.
  12. ↑ "Java Edition 1.3.1". Minecraft Wiki. Retrieved 24 September 2023.
  13. ↑ "MongoDB Connection String URI Format". MongoDB. Archived from the original on 10 December 2022. Retrieved 14 December 2022.
  14. ↑ "Add DNS SRV record support - mumble-voip/mumble". GitHub. Archived from the original on 5 July 2020. Retrieved 5 July 2020.
  15. ↑ "Baraza - Userguide". Archived from the original on 22 August 2008.
  16. ↑ "Puppet Docs: Scaling Puppet with compile masters, Using DNS SRV Records". Puppet Labs. Archived from the original on 11 October 2019. Retrieved 17 December 2019.
  17. ↑ "[Suggestion] TS DNS". Teamspeak Forum . Archived from the original on 14 November 2016. Retrieved 25 October 2013.
  18. ↑ "TeamSpeak 3 Client Version 3.0.8 Released". Teamspeak Forum . Archived from the original on 27 September 2016. Retrieved 5 July 2020.
  19. ↑ "XEP-0156: Discovering Alternative XMPP Connection Methods". XMPP.org . Archived from the original on 7 May 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012.
  20. ↑ "A new feature is available that enables Outlook 2007 to use DNS Service Location (SRV) records to locate the Exchange Autodiscover service". Microsoft Support . 13 May 2010. Archived from the original on 20 April 2012. Retrieved 23 May 2012.
  21. ↑ Koch, Werner. "OpenPGP Web Key Directory draft-koch-openpgp-webkey-service-06". IETF Datatracker. Internet Engineering Task Force. Retrieved 5 June 2021.
  22. ↑ Koch, Werner. "OpenPGP Web Key Directory draft-koch-openpgp-webkey-service-12". IETF Datatracker. Internet Engineering Task Force. Retrieved 5 June 2021.
  23. ↑ Cotton, M.; Eggert, L.; Touch, J.; Westerlund, M.; Cheshire, S. (August 2011). Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) Procedures for the Management of the Service Name and Transport Protocol Port Number Registry. IETF. doi: 10.17487/RFC6335 . RFC 6335. Archived from the original on 6 July 2020. Retrieved 6 July 2020.
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