I am currently trying to fix a flawed build at my location and want to get some suggestions / ideas about how best to proceed.
The systems (Windows 2003 and RHEL 4) came configured with an alias for each of four subnets:
server1 1.1.1.2
alias1server1 2.2.2.2
alias2server1 3.3.3.2
alias3server1 4.4.4.2
Each of these systems had each others entries in the hosts
file, which made them each around 10 pages (in notepad). The first subnet is a public subnet; the other three are private and geared towards server to server communications and backups. Please note, each IP address is configured on a separate physical NIC.
I'm now trying to do the logical thing and setup Active Directory with DNS integration so that I can get rid of the hosts files and make things run a little smoother, get away from hosts
files and allow us to better audit and administer our enterprise.
Based on the research that I've done, I have setup my AD server to be single-homed, and only plan on adding in the primary server name as an object in AD. This leads me to the problem: what to do about the aliases and other subnets? Each subnet lacks an FQDN; they are just IP's and a hostname alias.
I have thought of different courses of action, from using the hosts
files to allow the servers to look each other up or trying to create dummy A
records for the aliases and point them to the different subnets (in reverse-lookup zones). Any suggestions or ideas?