dynip-dns

Lightweight authoritative DNS server that resolves hostnames to IPs encoded directly in the subdomain label. No database, no dynamic updates — just encode the IP in the name.

How it works

The IP address is encoded in any subdomain label using dashes as separators:

Query	Resolves to
192-168-1-1.dyn.yourdomain.com	192.168.1.1
ip-10-0-0-5.dyn.yourdomain.com	10.0.0.5
foo.172-16-0-9.dyn.yourdomain.com	172.16.0.9
2001-db8--1.dyn.yourdomain.com	2001:db8::1
bar.ip6-2001-db8--42.dyn.yourdomain.com	2001:db8::42

IPv6 encoding: - → :, -- → ::

Supported record types: A, AAAA, NS, SOA, TXT, ANY

Install

Via APT (recommended)

curl -fsSL https://vr00mm.github.io/apt/pubkey.gpg | \
  sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/vr00mm.gpg

echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/vr00mm.gpg] https://vr00mm.github.io/apt stable main" | \
  sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/dynip-dns.list

sudo apt update && sudo apt install dynip-dns

From binary

Download the binary for your architecture from the Releases page, then:

sudo install -m 755 dynip-dns_linux_amd64 /usr/bin/dynip-dns
sudo mkdir -p /etc/dynip-dns
sudo cp package/etc/dynip-dns/dynip-dns.conf.example /etc/dynip-dns/dynip-dns.conf
# edit /etc/dynip-dns/dynip-dns.conf
sudo cp package/lib/systemd/system/dynip-dns.service /etc/systemd/system/
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now dynip-dns

Configuration

Edit /etc/dynip-dns/dynip-dns.conf (created automatically from the example on first APT install):

sudo nano /etc/dynip-dns/dynip-dns.conf
sudo systemctl restart dynip-dns

zone        = dyn.yourdomain.com
ttl         = 60
bind        = :53

ns1_host    = ns1.yourdomain.com
ns2_host    = ns2.yourdomain.com
ns1_ipv4    = 203.0.113.10
ns2_ipv4    = 203.0.113.11
# ns1_ipv6  = 2001:db8::10
# ns2_ipv6  = 2001:db8::11

hostmaster  = hostmaster.yourdomain.com
version_txt = dynip-dns
enable_glue = true
log_queries = true

Option	Default	Description
zone	yourdomain.com	Authoritative zone
ttl	60	Record TTL in seconds
bind	:53	Listen address
ns1_host	ns1.<zone>	Primary nameserver hostname
ns2_host	ns2.<zone>	Secondary nameserver hostname
ns1_ipv4	—	NS1 IPv4 glue address
ns2_ipv4	—	NS2 IPv4 glue address
ns1_ipv6	—	NS1 IPv6 glue address (optional)
ns2_ipv6	—	NS2 IPv6 glue address (optional)
hostmaster	hostmaster.<zone>	SOA hostmaster address
version_txt	dynip-dns	TXT record at zone apex
enable_glue	true	Include glue records in responses
log_queries	true	Log each DNS query

Test

dig @127.0.0.1 192-168-1-1.dyn.yourdomain.com A
dig @127.0.0.1 foo.192-168-1-1.dyn.yourdomain.com A
dig @127.0.0.1 2001-db8--1.dyn.yourdomain.com AAAA
dig @127.0.0.1 dyn.yourdomain.com SOA
dig @127.0.0.1 dyn.yourdomain.com NS
dig @127.0.0.1 dyn.yourdomain.com TXT

Docker

docker run -d \
  -p 53:53/udp -p 53:53/tcp \
  -e ZONE=yourdomain.com \
  -e NS1_IPV4=203.0.113.10 \
  -e NS2_IPV4=203.0.113.11 \
  ghcr.io/vr00mm/dynip-dns

Or with Docker Compose (edit the environment values in docker/docker-compose.yml first):

docker compose -f docker/docker-compose.yml up -d

Production

• Expose UDP 53 and TCP 53
• Use real public IPs for NS1_IPV4 / NS2_IPV4 (these become the A records for your nameserver hostnames)
• You can run a single node and point both NS1_HOST and NS2_HOST at the same server — deploying two separate nodes gives redundancy but is not required
• IPv6 glue is optional: set NS1_IPV6 / NS2_IPV6 only if your server has a public IPv6 address
• Set TTL=60 initially — increase once everything is stable
• See OVH_DELEGATION.md for step-by-step NS delegation

Contributing

git clone https://github.com/Vr00mm/dynip-dns.git
cd dynip-dns
go test ./...                  # run unit tests
go test -tags=integration ./... # run integration tests
go build ./cmd/dynip-dns       # build the binary

See CONTRIBUTING.md for the full guide.

License

See LICENSE.