History of ROOT-SERVERS: Difference between revisions

'''History of ROOT-SERVERS''' - A Journey from 4 nodes to 13 [[Root Server Operator|nodes]] at present. Based on the excerpt from “History of Root DNS Servers” by [[RSSAC]].<ref>[https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/rssac-023-04nov16-en.pdf RSSAC023]</ref><ref>[https://blog.gauravkansal.in/2022/02/history-of-root-servers.html Gaurav Kansal's Blog]</ref>

To test the DNS, Postel and Mockapetris set up the first root server in 1984 at the [[Information Science Institute]] (ISI) at the University of South California (USC). The domain name services were running on the software developed by Mockapetris, named JEEVES. In 1985, an additional root was added at ISI.

|ISIB <ref>[  As the DNS was in the early stages of development, root name servers at ISI tended to change machines frequently. In November 1986, ISIB was retired, and replaced by another server named ISIA. In October 1987, ISIC (C.ISI.EDU) was retired as well. ]</ref>||JEEVES || Information Science Institute, USC

By March 1987, SRI-NIC was named SRI-NIC.ARPA, ISIC was named C.ISI.EDU, BRL-AOS was named BRL-AOS.ARPA, and ISIA (previously ISIB) was named A.ISI.EDU.

In October 1986, at the Internet Engineering Task Force ([[IETF]]) 6 meeting, Doug Kingston from BRL convened a workshop called “Name Domains for MILNET.” The primary focus was to explore the transition of MILNET to use domain names. <ref>[IETF 6 Proceedings: http://www.ietf.org/proceedings/06.pdf.]</ref> <br/>

As NSFNet traffic and registrations grew, people became aware of some cases of poor DNS service due to the limited number and reach of root servers. To address this issue, in July 1987, at the IETF 7 meeting, the name domain planning working group held a one-hour session to discuss root servers<ref>[IETF 7 Proceedings: http://www.ietf.org/proceedings/07.pdf.]</ref>. The goal of the meeting was to select root servers that would provide improved service to the NSFNET. The participants discussed and chose three new name servers –

|+ List of Root Servers in November 1987<ref>[http://marc.info/?l=namedroppers&m=95837781927013&w=2]</ref>

Thus, by November 1990, there were seven root servers –

There was an increasing need to have one or more root name servers in Europe to reduce the dependency on the few, expensive and unstable Internet links to the U.S. The issue was a topic of discussion at RIPE 1 on 22 May 1989. <ref>[https://www.ripe.net/participate/meetings/ripe-meetings/ripe-1]</ref>

In 1991, the Defense Information Systems Agency awarded the NIC contract to Government Systems, Inc. (GSI), which in turn outsourced the contract to Network Solutions, Inc. (NSI). As a result, a few changes happened –

By April 1993, the number of root name servers had grown to an extent where the size of a root hints response was approaching the limit of 512 bytes. Bill Manning and Paul Vixie developed a plan to rename all root servers under the root-servers.net domain. This would allow the use of DNS label compression to fit all the names within 512 bytes. Postel (IANA) agreed with the plan and Mark Kosters began the renaming phases in 1995.  

|NS.ISC.ORG ||F.root-server.net ||Internet Software Consortium <ref>[In 1994 when ISC first began to run a root name server, the company name was Internet Software Consortium. it was later changed to Internet Systems Consortium]</ref>

|NS.NIC.DDN.MIL ||G.root-server.net ||GSI (Operated by NSI)<ref>[The .mil zone is removed from the root servers in 2006 that had been providing authoritative support (A, B, E, F, G, and H).]</ref>

|AOS.ARL.ARMY.MIL || H.root-server.net || U.S. Army Research Lab <ref>[On 09th Dec 2002, IPv6 support added to H at address 2001:500:1::803f:235 (no AAAA’s added to root zone until 2008).]</ref>

Until 1996, there were only 9 Root Servers and with the migration to root-servers.net, operators were able to take advantage of DNS label compression,<ref>[Domain name compression was introduced in RFC1035 as an optional protocol feature and later mandated by RFC1123. In this scheme, an entire domain name or a list of labels at the end of a domain name is replaced with a pointer to a prior occurrence of the same name in the same message, thus eliminating the repetition of domain names in a message and reducing the size of the message. In the case of responses to root server priming queries, the domain root-servers.net appears only once in the response, instead of 13 times (once for each root server).]</ref>  leaving room for four additional root servers to fit within a 512-byte DNS response (will cover the 512-byte logic in detail in a subsequent article).<ref>[The limitation is specified in RFC 1035 because at the time there were networks that could not handle DNS packets larger than 512 bytes without fragmenting. Also, known firewall rules dropped DNS packets more than 512 bytes in size]</ref>

In January 1997, servers J-Root, K-Root, L-Root and M-Root, were added, serving the root zone exclusively. Postel (IANA) asked Network Solutions Inc. to set up two additional servers with the intention of moving them to suitable operators quickly thereafter. He kept two more servers at USC-ISI with the same intention. J-Root and K-Root were set up at Network Solutions on the U.S. East Coast, while L-Root and M-Root were at USC ISI on the U.S. West Coast.  

For the European region, a number of parties expressed their willingness to operate a second root name server. Jon Postel (IANA) encouraged all parties to seek consensus about the matter. After thorough discussion, there was consensus that the Réseaux IP Européens Network Coordination Centre (RIPE NCC) was the appropriate organization to operate the server because of its neutrality and technical expertise. In particular, the RIPE NCC was deemed able to change the server’s deployment following changes in Internet topology<ref>[At the time, all deployments were unicast. The RIPE DNS working group suggested deploying near or at one of the existing open exchange points. Consequently, the first deployment was at the LINX in London. The LINX contributed hosting and local hands, while the RIPE NCC provided the hardware and covered operations. This choice re-emphasized the independence of the location of the operator and the server itself. This was followed shortly thereafter by the deployment of a hot standby at the AMS-IX.]</ref>.

Before Postel’s death, it was planned that USC would transfer certain responsibilities, assets, and personnel to [[ICANN]]. Founded in 1998, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a private not-for-profit public benefit corporation. It has performed the IANA functions on behalf of the global Internet community since the organization’s creation in 1998. In 1999, this transfer occurred, which included [[L-Root]].