# How to set primary DNS to be manual and secondary to be DHCP?



## groggon (Jun 18, 2012)

Hello,

I am using dnsmasq locally and I have put my primary DNS to be 127.0.0.1
However, I have only a few addresses to be resolved by dnsmasq and I don't want to run a complete DNS cache server on my system.

Because it is a laptop and I am using it over various wifi networks, I need the secondary DNS to be updated by DHCP as I am roaming around. 

I want the primary one to be 127.0.0.1 but the rest to be whatever DHCP said it should be.

How can I achieve that? I think it will be easier to achieve through some system setting rather than by tweaking my dnsmasq install but I might be wrong on that and I am waiting for your input.

Thanks!


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## Satcomer (Jun 18, 2012)

127.0.0.1 ? Why? This is the  TCP/IP address for local loopback to test your TCP/IP setup. OS X use 127.0.0.1 your CUPS (printing System Settings) settings.


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## groggon (Jun 19, 2012)

What? What does CUPS have to do with anything? 127.0.0.1 is not used only by CUPS, I don't get your point


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## MisterMe (Jun 19, 2012)

What *Satcomer* is telling you is that 127.0.0.1 is your local computer known as *localhost*. To use 127.0.0.1 as the IP-address for your DNS server, then you must run a DNS server on *localhost*. It is hard to put into words how little sense this makes.


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## groggon (Jun 19, 2012)

Like you said, it doesn't make sense, unless I am missing something?


> I am using dnsmasq locally and I have put my primary DNS to be 127.0.0.1


 -> There is a DNS server running on localhost, it's just not  a complete cache (used for tunlr.net) and I want the DNS indicated by the DHCP server to be set as secondary so that whatever is not in my local DNS can still be resolved.


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## BjarneDM (Jun 23, 2012)

@Satcomer , @MisterMe : You frankly don't know what you are talking about. It makes perfect sense to run a DNS server on localhost when one is testing/developing webpages or has webservers on the local net.

@groggon
you can't mix and match DNS servers in that way as far as I know.

I'm in the same situation as you, and my way to resolve the mobility problem has been to use one or more of the globally available DNS servers like OpenDNS or Google.

Just open the Network pref.pane and enter the IP-numbers for the DNS servers with the 127.0.0.1 for dnsmasq as the first/top entry for each network interface


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## groggon (Jun 23, 2012)

That's what I have done for now. I was hoping for a cleaner solution but it seems this is the only possible solution. Thanks for your help!


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## Satcomer (Jun 24, 2012)

BjarneDM said:


> @Satcomer , @MisterMe : You frankly don't know what you are talking about. It makes perfect sense to run a DNS server on localhost when one is testing/developing webpages or has webservers on the local net.



Maybe he wants something simple like the shareware DNS Enabler or something along that line.  It will make his/her life so much simpler in the DNS web server mode easier.


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## Satcomer (Jun 24, 2012)

groggon said:


> What? What does CUPS have to do with anything? 127.0.0.1 is not used only by CUPS, I don't get your point



Well put in 127.0.0.1 in a browser address bar on an OS X machine. It will take a home user version of OS X to their DNS CUPS setting. That is what I am talking about.


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