This is release 3.0.2 of the Hesiod name service library. Hesiod can provide general name service for a variety of applications and is based on the Berkeley Internet Name Daemon (BIND). To prepare this directory for building, run the command "./configure". configure takes a number of options; use "./configure --help" to find out what they are. Hesiod requires a vaguely ANSI compiler to build; gcc will do. Run "make" or "make all" to build the Hesiod library and programs. Run "make install" to install Hesiod. You will want to create a configuration file named hesiod.conf in the sysconfdir (/usr/local/etc/hesiod.conf by default) on your client machines, reading something like: rhs=.your.domain lhs=.ns The value of rhs can be overridden at run time by the environment variable HES_DOMAIN. The value ".ns" for lhs is an unfortunate historical convention; ".hs" or "hesiod" would have been better. Nevertheless, you probably want to use ".ns" for compatibility with existing Hesiod domains. To create Hesiod information on your central name servers, you need to make them authoritative for the domain ns.your.domain with a line in named.boot reading something like: primary ns.your.domain named.hesiod And then in named.hesiod, you need data looking something like: ; SOA and NS records. @ IN SOA server1.your.domain admin-address.your.domain ( 40000 ; serial - database version number 1800 ; refresh - sec servers 300 ; retry - for refresh 3600000 ; expire - unrefreshed data 7200 ) ; min NS server1.your.domain NS server2.your.domain ; Actual Hesiod data. haynes.grplist TXT "haynes:2638" haynes.group TXT "haynes:*:2638:" 2638.gid CNAME haynes.group zephyr.sloc TXT "zephyrserver1.my.domain" zephyr.sloc TXT "zephyrserver2.my.domain" There is a mailing list at MIT for Hesiod users, hesiod@mit.edu. To get yourself on or off the list, send mail to hesiod-request@mit.edu.