NETWORKING

DNS Explained for IT Technicians

Learn what DNS does, what a lookup failure looks like, and how to separate DNS trouble from general network trouble.

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DNS purpose

DNS translates human-friendly names into information such as IP addresses so applications can locate services.

A useful distinction

If an IP address is reachable but the hostname is not, DNS becomes a strong troubleshooting candidate.

Client checks

Verify configured DNS servers, basic network reachability, the requested name, and lookup results using approved tools.

Server-side possibilities

Records can be missing, incorrect, stale, unavailable, or affected by delegation, caching, or policy.

Document evidence

Record the queried name, returned result or error, DNS server used, time, and comparison tests.

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