RustyBrick Web Technology Blog

Long-time DNS Timeout Issues Resolved

I've been having issues with OS X timing out on dns queries to my local BIND dns server.

Many people have written on the issue. I've been following the postings at macosxhints.com and tried everything.

Today, I believe I figured out a solution by hacking the resolv.conf file as follows:

1) Open Terminal
2) Type "sudo pico -w /etc/resolv.conf" at the prompt (without quotes)
3) Enter your root password
4) enter "options retry:15" on its own line
5) Type Cntr-X
6) Type "Y"
7) Hit Enter

That's it.

What does it do?
It tells the dns resolver to try 15 times before giving up. So if the server is really timing out, then it will tell you after 15 times. But the sites that take a long time to resolve will be fine.

I tried changing the resolver to timeout after 100 seconds, but it didn't work and everything seemed to timeout. So this is the next best thing.

Let me know if there are any issues or if this worked for you.