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auth-dangling-cname-nxdomain

Purpose

Authoritative peers often answer a dangling CNAME (CNAME present, target missing in-zone) as NXDOMAIN while still including the CNAME in the answer section. With Conduit in front, clients should see that same shape — Conduit does not strip the CNAME or turn the reply into a plain NODATA/empty answer.

How it works

  1. The authoritative peer serves a zone with only dangle CNAME gone (no target address record).
  2. A client asks Conduit for that alias as type A.
  3. The reply must be NXDOMAIN with a CNAME in the answer, matching what the peer returns if queried directly.

Outcomes

Outcome Meaning for operators
pass Through Conduit, dangling CNAME yields NXDOMAIN with the CNAME still answered, matching the auth peer.
fail Wrong rcode, missing CNAME, or Conduit’s answer disagreed with querying the peer directly.
skip Peer is not authoritative for this matrix (or profile out of scope).
characterized Not used for this case today. If it appeared, it would mean a documented peer-specific quirk rather than a Conduit regression.

Matrix: peer (by publisher)

Suites: full

Oracles: property, parity