GuidesUh, oh. Someone Deleted the DNS Domain!

Uh, oh. Someone Deleted the DNS Domain!

ServerWatch content and product recommendations are editorially independent. We may make money when you click on links to our partners. Learn More.




by Carl Campos

You are sitting at your workstation, looking for the umpteenth
time at that MCSE
certification path
for Windows 2000, when you hear it. 
“Uh, oh…”, one of the other network administrators says.  You
ignore him.  You’re looking for the IIS 5.0 exam to replace
your IIS 4.0 exam.  The IIS 5.0 exam doesn’t
exist.  

What to do if someone deletes the DNS Domain.

“Uh, oh…”, you hear again, this time in stereo.  Did these
guys just realize that they’re too late to finish that NT 4.0
certification?

One of your fellow administrators appears in front of your
cube.  His face is red, he’s sweating and he needs your
help.  “I was deleting a host in DNS and I accidentally deleted
the entire domain,” he says, out of breath.  “Isn’t there an
undo or something?” he asks, already knowing the answer.  You
get up and walk over to his machine.  He still has the NT 4.0
DNS Manager open.  Sure enough, the DNS zone for your division
of the company is gone.  Zone transfer had been misconfigured,
so your Secondary DNS Server had not been getting updated.

“What do we do?” he asks.  You stop the DNS service. 
Then, you ask the Backup Administrator to start the restore of the
DNS server’s C:WINNTSYSTEM32DNS directory.  “I don’t know,”
you reply.  “I’ve never had to do a disaster recovery on a DNS
Server before.”  

Everyone is looking to you to solve the problem as you sit down
and open your copy of TechNet.  You do a search for “DNS
recover” on TechNet.  You find article #Q180794,
How to Restore DNS Zones When Deleted from DNS
Manager
.  

According to the article, when a DNS zone is deleted from the DNS
manager GUI, the zone file is not deleted.  You check the
WINNTSYSTEM32DNS directory on the server, and sure enough, the
DNS zone file is still there.  You make a copy of the file and
open it in Notepad.  All of the records appear to be
present.  Now all you need to do is recreate the zone with the
same name as it had before, and you’ve fixed the problem!

After a couple of tests using nslookup,
you determine that the zone is functioning properly.  You tell
the Backup Administrator to stop the restore process.  Like all
good fables, there was a hero and everyone learned a lesson in the
end.  Lucky for your co-worker that the story wasn’t a
tragedy.

Get the Free Newsletter!

Subscribe to Daily Tech Insider for top news, trends & analysis

Latest Posts

Related Stories