Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

Part 1: Observe the DNS Conversion of a URL to an IP Address

a. Open a Windows command prompt.

b. At the command prompt, ping the URL for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN) at www.icann.org. ICANN coordinates the DNS, IP addresses, top-level domain name
system management, and root server system management functions. The computer must translate
www.icann.org into an IP address to know where to send the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)
packets.
The first line of the output displays www.icann.org converted to an IP address by DNS. You should be
able to see the effect of DNS, even if your institution has a firewall that prevents pinging, or if the
destination server has prevented you from pinging its web server.
Note: If the domain name is resolved to an IPv6 address, use the command ping -4 www.icann.org to
translate into an IPv4 address if desired.

Record the IP addresses for www.icann.org.

- 192.0.32.7 and 2620:0:2d0:200::7

c. Type the IPv4 addresses from step b into a web browser, instead of the URL. Enter https://192.0.32.7
in the web browser. If your computer has an IPv6 address you can enter the IPv6 address.
https://[2620:0:2d0:200::7] in the web browser.

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 Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

d. Notice that the ICANN home web page is displayed without using DNS.
Most humans find it easier to remember words, rather than numbers. If you tell someone to go to
www.icann.org, they can probably remember that. If you told them to go to 192.0.32.7, they would have
a difficult time remembering an IP address. Computers process in numbers. DNS is the process of
translating words into numbers. Additionally, there is a second translation that takes place. Humans think
in Base 10 numbers. Computers process in Base 2 numbers. The Base 10 IP address 192.0.32.7 in Base
2 numbers is 11000000.00000000.00100000.00000111. What happens if you cut and paste these Base
2 numbers into a browser?

- The web site does not display. The software code used in web browsers recognizes Base 10 numbers. It does not
recognize Base 2 numbers.

e. At a command prompt, ping www.cisco.com.

Note: If the domain name is resolved to an IPv6 address, use the command ping -4 www.cisco.com to
translate into an IPv4 address if desired.

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Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

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 Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

When you ping www.cisco.com, do you get the same IP address as the example? Explain.

- The answer will vary based on your geographic location. Cisco's online material is hosted on a number of mirror
servers. This implies that Cisco uploads the identical material to servers located all over the world. When a user
attempts to access www.cisco.com, the traffic is routed to the nearest mirror server.

Type the IP address that you obtained when you pinged www.cisco.com into a browser. Does the web
site display? Explain.

- The Cisco website does not load. Because either some web servers are set to accept IP addresses transmitted from
a browser, while others are not. Or there might be a firewall rule in the Cisco security system that prevents an IP
address from being communicated through a browser. Depending on the Web Browser, you may also see a notice
indicating that the connection is not secure or that there is a certificate error.

Part 2: Observe DNS Lookup Using the nslookup Command on a Web Site
a. At the command prompt, type the nslookup command.

What is the default DNS server used?

Result varies from location to location and due to different configuration

b. Notice how the command prompt changed to a greater than (>) symbol. This is the nslookup
prompt. From this prompt, you can enter commands related to DNS.
At the prompt, type ? to see a list of all the available commands that you can use in nslookup mode.

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Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

c. At the nslookup prompt, type www.cisco.com.

What is the translated IPv4 address?

- 113.171.30.105

Note: The IP address from your location will most likely be different because Cisco uses mirrored servers
in various locations around the world.
Is it the same as the IP address shown with the ping command?
- Yes
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Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

Under addresses, in addition to the 172.230.155.162 IP address, there are the following numbers:
2600:1404:a:395::b33 and 2600:1404:a:38e:::b33. What are these?

- IPv6 (IP version 6) IP addresses at which the web site is reachable.

d. At the nslookup prompt, type the IP address of the Cisco web server that you just found. You can use
nslookup to get the domain name of an IP address if you do not know the URL.

You can use the nslookup tool to translate domain names into IP addresses. You can also use it to
translate IP addresses into domain names.

Using the nslookup tool, record the IP addresses associated with www.google.com.

- 2404:6800:4005:819::2004 and 172.217.27.4

Part 3: Observe DNS Lookup Using the nslookup Command on Mail Servers
a. At the nslookup prompt, type set type=mx to use nslookup to identify mail servers.
b. At the nslookup prompt, type cisco.com.

A fundamental principle of network design is redundancy (more than one mail server is configured). In
this way, if one of the mail servers is unreachable, then the computer making the query tries the second
mail server. Email administrators determine which mail server is contacted first by using MX preference.
The mail server with the lowest MX preference is contacted first.

Based upon the output above, which mail server will be contacted first when the email is sent to
cisco.com?

- rcdn-mx-01.cisco.com

c. At the nslookup prompt, type exit to return to the regular PC command prompt.
d. At the PC command prompt, type ipconfig /all.

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 Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

Write the IP addresses of all the DNS servers that your school uses.

- fec0:0:0:ffff::1%1 , fec0:0:0:ffff::2%1, fec0:0:0:ffff::3%1

Reflection Question
What is the fundamental purpose of DNS?

- DNS is essentially the Internet's phone book. So DNS converts names into numbers. The numbers might
be IPv4 or IPv6.
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Lab - Observe DNS Resolution

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