nsupdate: What does the error NOTIMP mean?

Question

I tried to add a dns entry using nsupdate:

printf 'update add myhost.mydomain.com 86400 A 172.16.1.1\nsend\n' | nsupdate

I'm getting the error:

 update failed: NOTIMP

what does it mean?

Answer 1

It means that the nameserver which received the request does not implement DNS "UPDATE" (RFC 2136) requests, that is, it doesn't support dynamic updates.

But make sure you're sending the update to the correct server; try using the server … command before anything else.

Answer 2

I am getting the same error on a simple query

dig any eoaclk.com @1.1.1.1

; <<>> DiG 9.8.2rc1-RedHat-9.8.2-0.62.rc1.el6_9.5 <<>> any eoaclk.com @1.1.1.1
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: **NOTIMP**, id: 19761
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

It appears the answer is still "not implemented", and I can verify that with just the fact that I can get a response from a reduced query to the same server. Apparently this server doesn't support the "ANY" option.

$ dig eoaclk.com @1.1.1.1

; <<>> DiG 9.8.2rc1-RedHat-9.8.2-0.62.rc1.el6_9.5 <<>> eoaclk.com @1.1.1.1
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 2395
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 3, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;eoaclk.com.                    IN      A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
eoaclk.com.             60      IN      A       35.167.132.154
eoaclk.com.             60      IN      A       52.40.97.221
eoaclk.com.             60      IN      A       54.213.184.87

;; Query time: 129 msec
;; SERVER: 1.1.1.1#53(1.1.1.1)
;; WHEN: Mon Apr 23 10:59:21 2018
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 76