(1) DNS is hard

It's really not.

Just because some systems took something fundamentally simple and wrapped a bunch of unnecessary complexity around it does not make it hard.

At its core, it's an elegant, minimal protocol.

▲

bwblabs 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

It falls into the category that most people think they understand DNS, the same as JavaScript, or e.g. elections, but the devil is in the detail. And I can tell you, at least for DNS (and Dutch Elections), it's kind of tricky, see fun cases like https://github.com/internetstandards/Internet.nl/issues/1370 and I thought the same before I had my current job which involves quite some tricky DNS stuff (and regarding this we also sometimes encounter bugs in unbound https://github.com/internetstandards/Internet.nl/issues/1803 )

But maybe DNSSEC is the 'unnecessary complexity' for you (I think it's kind of fundamental to secure DNS). Also without DNSSEC they needed RFC's like https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc8020 to clarify fundamentals (same goes for https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc8482 to fix stuff).

▲

cryptonector 3 days ago | parent [-]

Dutch elections? How do they come into this?

	▲	bwblabs a day ago \| parent [-]
		There is this list of things tech people think they understand (DNS, javascript), and more common you can see this with everyday people, e.g. with stuff like elections: the basic concept is clear, understandable, but the devil/complexity is in the detail, how to handle certain exceptions. I was employed by the Election Management Body of The Netherlands for a few years, so I can only vouch for the complexity of that relatively simple election system, but I'm pretty sure it will hold for about every country ;)

▲

kccqzy 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You and GP are talking about completely different things. Yes DNS at its core it’s an elegant minimal protocol. But all the complexity comes from client side configuration before the protocol is even involved.

We have complexity like different kinds of VPNs, from network-level VPNs to app-based VPNs to MDM-managed VPNs possibly coexisting. We have on-demand VPNs that only start when a particular domain is being visited: yes VPN starting because of DNS. We have user-provided or admin-provided hardcoded responses in /etc/hosts. We have user-specified resolver overrides (for example the user wants to use 8.8.8.8 not ISP resolver). We have multiple sources of network-provided resolvers from RDNSS to DHCPv6 O mode.

It is non-trivial to determine which resolver to even start sending datagrams with that elegant minimal protocol.

▲

tptacek 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Lots of elegant, minimal things are hard to use effectively.