Independent Submission M. Andrews
Request for Comments: 7314 ISC
Category: Experimental July 2014
ISSN: 2070-1721
Extension Mechanisms for DNS (EDNS) EXPIRE Option
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RFC 7314 Extension Mechanisms for DNS (EDNS) EXPIRE Option July 2014
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
The expire field of a DNS zone's SOA record [RFC1035] is supposed to indicate when a secondary server shall discard the contents of the zone when it has been unable to contact the primary [RFC1034]. Current practice only works when all the secondaries contact the primary directly to perform refresh queries and zone transfers.
1.1. Reserved Words
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119].
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RFC 7314 Extension Mechanisms for DNS (EDNS) EXPIRE Option July 2014 2. Expire EDNS Option (Query)The EDNS [RFC6891] EXPIRE option has the value <9>. The EDNS EXPIRE option MAY be included on any QUERY, though usually this is only done on SOA, AXFR, and IXFR queries involved in zone maintenance. This is done by adding a zero-length EDNS EXPIRE option to the options field of the OPT record when the query is made.
3. Expire EDNS Option (Response) 3.1. Primary ServerWhen the query is directed to the primary server for the zone, the response will be an EDNS EXPIRE option of length 4 containing the value of the SOA EXPIRE field, in seconds and network byte order.
3.2. Secondary Server
When the query is directed to a secondary server for the zone, then the response will be an EDNS EXPIRE option of length 4 containing the value of the expire timer on that server, in seconds and network byte order.
3.3. Non-authoritative Server
If an EDNS EXPIRE option is sent to a server that is not authoritative for the zone, it MUST NOT add an EDNS EXPIRE option to the response.
4. Secondary Behaviour
When a secondary server performs a zone-transfer request or a zone- refresh query, it SHALL add an EDNS EXPIRE option to the query message.
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RFC 7314 Extension Mechanisms for DNS (EDNS) EXPIRE Option July 2014 5. IANA ConsiderationsIANA has assigned an EDNS option code point for the EDNS EXPIRE option specified in Section 2 with "Optional" status in the "DNS EDNS0 Option Codes (OPT)" registry.
6. Security Considerations
The method described in this document ensures that servers that no longer have a connection to the primary server, direct or indirectly, cease serving the zone content when SOA EXPIRE timer is reached. This prevents stale data from being served indefinitely.
7. Normative References
[RFC1034] Mockapetris, P., "Domain names - concepts and facilities",