Using DNS with WINS

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WINS works with the Windows 2000 implementation of Domain Name System (DNS), which is an Internet and TCP/IP networking protocol that provides a scalable and dynamic database service. DNS in Windows 2000 registers and resolves DNS domain names used on private networks and on the Internet. It can provide DNS name service for networked clients, as described in the DNS standard. For more information about DNS, see "Introduction to DNS" and "Windows 2000 DNS" in this book.

In Windows 2000, as with Windows NT 4.0, implementation of DNS is tightly integrated with WINS. This allows non-WINS clients to resolve NetBIOS names by querying a DNS server. Administrators can now remove static entries for Microsoft-based clients in older DNS server zone files in favor of the dynamic integration of WINS and DNS. For example, if a third-party client wants to access a Web page on a WWW server that is enabled for DHCP and WINS, the client can query the DNS server, the DNS server queries WINS, and the name is resolved and returned to the client. Before the integration of WINS and DNS, dynamic IP addressing would have made it impossible to reliably resolve the name in such a situation.

WINS Interoperability Options for DNS

If most of your clients use NetBIOS and you are using Windows 2000 DNS, consider enabling WINS lookup on your DNS servers. When WINS lookup is enabled on DNS servers, WINS resolves any names that DNS resolution does not find. The WINS forward lookup and WINS-R reverse lookup records are supported by Windows 2000 DNS only. If you use third-party DNS servers, use DNS Manager to prevent these WINS records from propagating to the third-party DNS servers that do not support WINS lookup.

If most of your networked computers run Windows 2000, consider upgrading older WINS clients to Windows 2000 and establishing DNS as your only method of name resolution. Support issues involving network name service are simplified if you use a single naming and resource locator service on your network. For more information on moving from an environment combining WINS and DNS to an environment using only Windows 2000 DNS, see "Decommissioning WINS" in this chapter.