Trying to run a server on a static IP from my house, DNS questions

[Chris Mohler]

On Thu, Dec 25, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Xn Nooby <xnooby at gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
> Any suggestions?

Yes - I suggest using GD's nameservers - they're fast and likely to be
up most of the time.  If you want to learn DNS by all means go ahead -
but what the GD person told you was a bit misleading - they do in fact
host your DNS at this point.

GD is bad about hiding things - but there should be a link somewhere
to "Total DNS Control" or similar - it's a HTML form that will let you
modify all DNS entries directly.

I suggest deleting *all* CNAME entries, making A records for server,
www.server, mail.server, etc - and most importantly (in your case)
setting the MX to an A record (eg, mail.server).  I do not argue that
what I suggest is the best all-around approach - it's just a simple
one that will work. (Also add a SPF entry to make sure you can send
mail without it being rejected or flagged as spam).

Here's what I use to query my MX record (test server):
dig XXXX at XXXX:~/Desktop$ dig MX cr33k.com

; <<>> DiG 9.5.0-P2 <<>> MX cr33k.com
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 55932
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;cr33k.com.			IN	MX

;; ANSWER SECTION:
cr33k.com.		3600	IN	MX	0 mail.cr33k.com.

;; Query time: 108 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.2.1#53(192.168.2.1)
;; WHEN: Wed Dec 24 22:49:07 2008
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 48

XXXX at XXXX:~/Desktop$ dig mail.cr33k.com

; <<>> DiG 9.5.0-P2 <<>> mail.cr33k.com
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 47471
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;mail.cr33k.com.			IN	A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
mail.cr33k.com.		3600	IN	A	75.127.119.217

;; Query time: 77 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.2.1#53(192.168.2.1)
;; WHEN: Wed Dec 24 22:49:19 2008
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 48

So you should be able to "dig MX server" and then "dig" whatever
record is returned and get an IP - if that's not working, you will not
get mail .

There are some useful suggestions posted already - and I do not
pretend to be an expert.  Hopefully I've helped you out though, and
Good Luck ;)

Chris