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RFC 3596 / DNS FOR IPv6

Store one IPv6 address per AAAA record

01

DNS means Domain Name System: a distributed directory of records. An AAAA record associates a name with one IPv6 address.

DIAGRAMRead RFC section 2.1 ↗
RFC 3596 · § 2.1EXAMPLE
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Store one IPv6 address per AAAA recordChosen owner picnic.example. maps to IPv6 address 2001:db8::1 in one AAAA record. A second IPv6 address needs another AAAA record. A separate A record retains IPv4 support. A final chosen untruncated AAAA answer contains both associated AAAA entries, not the A entry or a concatenated two-address field. No actual query is sent.Fictional DNS records · one owner namepicnic.example.Question: picnic.example. IN AAAAAnswer (AAAA set):picnic.example. AAAA 2001:db8::1picnic.example. AAAA 2001:db8::2No A → AAAA conversion · no connection yet
04
Request the AAAA set.

In this untruncated positive example, the answer contains both associated AAAA records. The A record is not converted or included as an AAAA answer.

Source for this drawing: RFC 3596 · Read RFC section 2.1 ↗

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RFC 1034 DNS RFC 8200 IPv6 RFC 5952 IPv6 text

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KEY POINT

Keep record type and address count separate.

  • Type AAAA has decimal type code 28 and is specific to the Internet class (IN). Its data stores one 128-bit IPv6 address.
  • A host with more than one IPv6 address needs more than one AAAA record. Do not put two addresses into one record’s data field.
  • Existing IPv4 support is retained: an A record stores an IPv4 address. AAAA does not replace A or make the named service reachable.
DETAILS

Chosen records for picnic.example. and documentation addresses are fictional. A resource record is one typed entry; a set can contain multiple entries with the same name and type. This is not an address-order or connection-selection algorithm.

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