DNS Record Types Explained
How Does a browser know where a website lives ?
The Browser does not know directly where a website lives, it knows through DNS (Domian Name System) it recognize the IP address of live website , DNS recognize server in recursive approach until the main server address is found where our website is live .
What is DNS ?
DNS mean Domain Name System , it is a phonebook of internet . We can access any website through its domain name and our web browser interact with IP address of website , DNS translate our domain name into IP address. after finding ip address our dns interact our ip with browser .
Why DNS Records are needed ?
At this time we know about that our website is stored in an IP address and our domain name recognize IP address through DNS.
How DNS recognize IP address ?
DNS hold records which is called DNS records. DNS records help to recognize IP address. DNS record are not just associated with IP address , this records also handle requests for that domain like mail and security etc.
NS Records
Name Server Records refers which DNS server is authoritative for that domain, mean which server holds the DNS record for that domain , basically when we searched the domain on the internet our domain goes to find his authoritative server because authoritative server find domain actual IP address .
Name Server is the type of DNS server which stores all type of DNS record like A, AAAA , CNAME, MX , TXT etc .
A Record
A record is type of DNS record which recognize IPv4 address for that domain , A record holds IPv4 addresses for the websites . A record like we can not remember latitude and longitude of any person address but we remember the address in form of country, city , state etc. it mean our A record holds that the address (country, city, state) is equal to this latitude and longitude.
AAAA Record
AAAA record is type of DNS record , AAAA record hold IPv6 addresses of domain , it mean when our ip address is version 6 it mean it will be hold in AAAA record in domain . IT is same like A record but our A record can not hold IPv6 addresses .
CNAME Record
CNAME record is type of DNS record , CNAME holds the another name of domain it points the another name to the main domain. CNAME is like home office of an employee , just like a person A and B , B is work in an office and A person want to meet B for some work but A person dont know the address of his home but he know his office home then A person go to office and Meet him
MX Record
MX record is type of DNS record , MX record direct the mail to mail server . Just like if any postman has to deliver letter on our home then in post office our inbox address is stored , through it postman deliver the letter to our inbox. here our MX record which is hold by post office .
TXT Record
TXT record is type of DNS record , the work of TXT record to hold the value which is read by machine for checking the ownership of domain . Like when we have to connet our domain with google workspace then we have to TXT record whcih is gave by google we add TXT record and we addd our domain on google workspace it verify the ownership of domain.
How all DNS records works together for one website ?
When user request on the domain our Recursive DNS server works and find the NS records which holds the authoritative DNS server after finding the authoritative DNS server we find our domain in that authoritative server which hold the records after finding domain we find the A/AAAA records where A/AAAA record hold the IP address of the server , and domain MX records handle email of that domain and TXT records verify security using stored value .
- Written by - VIVEK YADAV*
