VPS.NET comes with free geographically redundant DNS using Anycast which can easily be managed using the Dashboard, there are many advantages over using the DNS service provided by VPS.NET, these include redundancy, speed and disaster recovery.
To get started with DNS on VPS.NET, first login to your dashboard and from the main dashboard home page select “Manage my DNS” from the list. You can follow the guide here if you are not sure how to do this.
There are 3 key things you can do with DNS on the dashboard:
- Create Domains in DNS (you must own or control the domains added)
- Edit existing domains
- Remove existing domains
Creating a Domain
This is a very simple task and only takes a few minutes. On the “Manage my DNS” page there is a field to enter your domain name with a drop down box next to it.
To create a domain simply fill in the text box with your domain name (without any www or http:// tags), from the drop down box you can select the IP of your VPS if you have already created one and click “Add Domain” when you are happy.
To manage your domains using the VPS.NET dashboard you need to change the nameservers of your domain. This is done at the domain registrar where you purchased your domain from. You will need to change your nameservers to:
dns1.vps.net
dns2.vps.net
Editing a Domain
From your “Manage my DNS” page you can edit any domain you have setup in your VPS.NET account. To edit a domain select it from the list by clicking on it. From here you can edit an existing DNS record, add a new DNS record and/or remove an existing record.
Then you are presented with the DNS records page for the domain you selected, if you followed the create domain guide above you will get a page looking similar to this:
To edit records simply select the part of the record you wish to edit and type the replacement value, you can edit:
- The record type (eg A, CNAME etc)
- The record name (eg www, mail etc)
- In the case of MX records you can also edit the priority of the record
When you have finished editing a record, simply click outside of the field and the following will briefly appear:
Adding a DNS record is much like adding a domain except there are more options, first select the record type from the drop down menu, insert the name of the record (the part before the domain – e.g. www) then enter the target, for an A record this is an IP address, the priority field is only used for MX records.
Click add when you are done and if successful the following will appear:
If you input incorrect data such as an impossible IP address, the form will return an error for you.
Correct the error indicated to you and click add again. If the error was simply a typo and it was accepted, just click the incorrect field and edit it like any other record.
To remove a record simply click the trash can icon on the same line as the record you wish to move.
You will be asked to confirm the removal.
Removing a Domain
To remove a domain, you need to be on the main “Manage your DNS” page with your list of domains. To delete a domain just click the delete domain link on the same line as the domain.
You will be asked to confirm this: