dnsns 1 user commands djbwares
dnsns look up the name server records of a domain name
`dnsns` fqdn

## Description

`dnsns` looks up the `NS` resource records for fqdn in the Domain Name System, and prints them.

Normally `dnsns` exits 0. If it encounters a temporary problem that prevents it from determining the `NS` resource records, it prints an error message and exits 111.

`dnsns` makes all DNS lookups using the locally configured DNS proxy server(s), and performs no name qualification on what is taken to already be a "fully-qualified" domain name (trailing dot or no) fqdn. See djbdns-client 5 for how this server is found, and for certain standard domain names that short-circuit DNS lookups to the proxy DNS server(s).

fqdn can take the appearance of the human-readable form of a (legal and well-formed) IPv4 address. However, it is always considered to be a domain name and passed to the locally configured proxy DNS server(s) for lookup. dnscache 1 filters queries for such names and synthesizes fixed responses to them that list no `NS` resource records. Other proxy DNS servers rely upon the fact that the public "`.`" content DNS servers state that these domains do not exist, and generate bogus traffic to those servers.

## History

`dnsns` was added to djbwares in 2025.

## Author

Original code of dnsmx 1 (from which this is derived) by Daniel J. Bernstein. Documentation modernizations by Jonathan de Boyne Pollard.