How Do You Tell Nslookup to Use a Specific DNS Server?
Nslookup is a powerful command-line tool that allows you to query the Domain Name System (DNS) to obtain information about domain names and IP addresses. By default, when you use nslookup, it uses the DNS server configured on your computer or network.
However, there may be situations where you need to specify a specific DNS server to use. In this tutorial, we will explore how you can tell nslookup to use a specific DNS server.
Using the ‘server’ Command in Nslookup
To tell nslookup to use a specific DNS server, you can make use of the ‘server’ command. This command allows you to change the default DNS server used by nslookup for subsequent queries. To do this, follow these steps:
- Open a command prompt or terminal window.
- Type ‘nslookup’ followed by a space.
- Type ‘server’ followed by space and the IP address of the DNS server you want to use.
- Press Enter.
For example:
nslookup
server 8.8.8
This will set the DNS server for nslookup queries as 8.8, which is Google’s public DNS server.
Verifying the Changed DNS Server
If you want to verify that nslookup is now using the specified DNS server, follow these steps:
- Type a domain name or IP address that you want to query.
- Press Enter.
The result should show the information obtained from the specified DNS server.
Example:
google.com
This will display the DNS records and IP address associated with the domain name ‘google.com’, as obtained from the specified DNS server.
Restoring Default DNS Server
If you want to reset nslookup to use the default DNS server configured on your computer or network, you can use the following command:
server
This will revert nslookup back to using the default DNS server.
Conclusion
In this tutorial, we learned how to tell nslookup to use a specific DNS server. By using the ‘server’ command followed by the IP address of the desired DNS server, you can change the default DNS server used by nslookup for subsequent queries.
This can be helpful in troubleshooting network issues or testing specific DNS configurations. Remember that specifying a specific DNS server only affects nslookup and does not change the default DNS configuration of your computer or network.