Re: [DNSOP] WGLC for draft-ietf-dnsop-let-localhost-be-localhost-02

[Paul Vixie <[e-mail]>]

viktor, i don't disagree with your goals, but i have a proposal as to 
method.

no resolver should be sending single-label names in DNS requests, period.

search list processing should not be applied to the "localhost" single 
label name, ever.

operating system lookups like gethostbyname() or similar, that are 
willing to look at the /etc/hosts or local equivalent, should be willing 
to discover any entry, even single-label names such as "localhost".

if there is no /etc/hosts or similar that can contain something like the 
"localhost" name, then the operating system library (gethostbyname or 
similar) ought to translate this to ::1 (or 127.0.0.1) in hard code.

in other words there is no situation in which NXDOMAIN should be 
encountered for the "localhost" name, because no query should ever be 
sent. and that's mostly true today. localhost is getting returned due to 
search list processing, when it's returned by DNS at all.

because i don't think outlawing the name in an RDNS responder is the 
right place for this logic, nor that these responders are likely to be 
updated soon, nor that an operator of such a server will decide that 
implementing this change is in their best interests (wrt help desk calls.)

paul