greetz here is a sample copy of my public dns configuration #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ #GLOBAL CONFIGURATIONS #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ options { #DAEMON CONFIGURATIONS also-notify { 123.234.123.12; 123.23.234.21; }; allow-transfer { 123.234.123.12; }; allow-recursion { 127.0.0.1; }; cleaning-interval 720; directory "/var/lib/named"; dump-file "/var/log/named/named_dump.db"; forward first; forwarders { 123.234.123.12; 123.23.234.21; }; listen-on port 53 { 192.168.1.1; 127.0.0.1; }; listen-on-v6 { none; }; memstatistics-file "/var/log/named/memstat_dump.db"; minimal-responses yes; max-transfer-time-out 120; max-transfer-idle-out 60; notify yes; notify-source * port 53; pid-file "/var/run/named/named.pid"; query-source address * port 53; statistics-file "/var/lib/named/log/named.stats"; recursion no; transfer-source * port 53; transfer-format many-answers; transfers-out 4; transfers-per-ns 2; version "4.9.5"; zone-statistics yes; }; key "rndc-key" { algorithm hmac-md5; secret " secret "u2Go+i75PmXCwwvhZLVde+ufCD+EM6IA37Uda879EuPEM6IA37Uda879EuPhemn3FvALsQFA1bnv3ieMvxFobuOBXpSRAB4IbWVPq/=="; }; controls { inet 127.0.0.1 port 953 allow { 127.0.0.1; } keys { "rndc-key"; }; }; logging { channel query_logging { file "/var/log/named_querylog" versions 3 size 100M; print-time yes; // timestamp log entries }; category queries { query_logging; }; channel syslog_queries { syslog user; severity info; }; category queries { syslog_queries; }; channel syslog_errors { syslog user; severity error; }; category default { syslog_errors; }; category lame-servers { null; }; category default { log_file; }; category xfer-in { log_file; }; category xfer-out { log_file; }; channel log_file { file "/var/log/bind.log" size 100M versions 0; }; }; #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Localhost zones #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ zone "." in { type hint; file "root.hint"; }; zone "localhost" in { type master; file "localhost.zone"; }; #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # reverse zones #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ zone "0.0.127.in-addr.arpa" in { type master; file "reverse/127.0.0.zone"; }; #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ # Public Master zones #------------------------------------------------------------------------------ zone "mydomain.net" in { type master; file "master/mydomain.net.zone"; notify yes; allow-transfer { 12.321.12.43; localhost; 234.43.343.3; }; }; that was a good point you noted relating to the ETHx interface names changing on different boots, ive been surprised and wonder what is behind it causing it, personally i consider it to be a pain in the **** if some one could ellaborate and explain why this is happening then i would gladly listen as i have not had the time to persue this subject and it would be good to know, as for configuring the itnerface, you can manually configure them as the configuration files are in /etc/sysconfig/network each configuration file for each interface starts with ifcfg-ethx-33-333-33-33 (the remainder octets are the mac address of the itnerface, this is a good convention but you can easilly get typos :P) just as a side note, the suse network configurations are comprehensive and good, though many distros and linux in general lack a single quiet important parameter that could be added in these itnerface configuration scrits and that is the parameter with which you could define the ethernet connection type to whether be 10/100 & half/full i dont recall the exact syntax right now but i can post it if someone needs it :) a sample configuration has something like this BOOTPROTO='static' MTU='' NAME='Intel EtherExpress PRO/100+' REMOTE_IPADDR='' STARTMODE='auto' UNIQUE='kJJN.loR8Bor5JpB' USERCONTROL='no' _nm_name='bus-pci-0000:00:0a.0' BROADCAST='192.168.1.255' IPADDR='192.168.1.23' NETMASK='255.255.255.0' NETWORK='192.168.1.0' in the same directory you willl find a file named routes that defines the default gw you need only one and that is the one pointing towards the router, as for the dns settings for the host (not bind/named service/deamon) you can find the configuration file under /etc within a file called resolv.conf the file contains something like this. nameserver 192.159.12.32 nameserver 123.34.234.22 search mydomain.net hisdomain.net you have allready configured the forwarding so ill skip on that :) but now you have some sample configs to compare to :) regards RutePoint