Khost (1) Linux Manual Page

NAME

khost: – Simple DNS lookup utility (libknot equivalent of ISC host)

SYNOPSIS

khost [options] name [server]

DESCRIPTION

This utility sends a DNS query for the name to the server and prints a reply in more user-readable form. For more advanced DNS queries use kdig instead.

name: Is a domain name that is to be looked up. If the name is IPv4 or IPv6 address the PTR query type is used.
server: Is a name or an address of the nameserver to send a query to. The address can be specified using [address]:port notation. If no server is specified the servers from /etc/resolv.conf are used.
If no arguments are provided, khost prints short help.

OPTIONS

-4: Use IPv4 protocol only.
-6: Use IPv6 protocol only.
-a: Send ANY query with verbose mode.
-d: Enable debug messages if any.
-h, –help: Print help.
-r: Disable recursion.
-s: Stop querying next nameserver if SERVFAIL response is received.
-T: Use TCP protocol.
-v: Enable verbose output.
-V, –version: Print program version.
-w: Wait forever for the reply.
-c class: Set query class (e.g. CH, CLASS4). The default class is IN.
-t type: Set query type (e.g. NS, IXFR=12345, TYPE65535). The default is to send 3 queries (A, AAAA and MX).
-R retries: The number (>=0) of UDP retries to query a nameserver. The default is 1.
-W wait: The time to wait for a reply in seconds. This timeout applies to each query try. The default is 2 seconds.

NOTES

Missing features with regard to ISC host

Options -C, -i, -l, -m, -N.

Differences with regard to ISC host

Option -d is not equivalent to -v, but enables debug messages.

The number of retries can be set to zero.
Verbose mode has slightly different format (same as kdig).

EXAMPLES

Example 1. Get A, AAAA and MX records for example.com:

# khost example.com
Example 2. Get reverse record for address 192.0.2.1:
# khost 192.0.2.1
Example 3. Perform verbose zone transfer for zone example.com:
# khost -t AXFR -v example.com

FILES

/etc/resolv.conf

AUTHOR

Daniel Salzman (www.knot-dns.cz)

Please send any bug reports or comments to knot-dns [at] labs.nic.cz

khost (1) Linux Manual Page