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Manual Installation

Install Bindizr and a BIND secondary on the same Linux host, then create and query a zone. The package uses SQLite and a systemd service by default.

1. Install a name server

Bindizr drives the secondary over standard AXFR, IXFR, NOTIFY and catalog zones, so any server in Secondary Servers will do. BIND is what the rest of this page installs.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install dnsutils bind9

sudo yum install bind bind-utils

2. Download Bindizr and install

You can download the latest Bindizr binary from Release. Each release also carries THIRD_PARTY_LICENSES.html, the licenses of the crates the binaries are built from.

To build the binary yourself instead, see Building from Source.

# Install using dpkg (bindizr_*_arm64.deb on arm64)
sudo dpkg -i bindizr_*_amd64.deb

# Verify installation
bindizr --version

# Install the .rpm package (bindizr-*.aarch64.rpm on arm64)
sudo rpm -i bindizr-*.x86_64.rpm

# Verify installation
bindizr --version

3. Configure Bindizr

The package installs /etc/bindizr/bindizr.conf.toml ready to run: SQLite at /var/lib/bindizr/bindizr.db and DNS on 127.0.0.1:5300, leaving port 53 to the secondary. For MySQL or PostgreSQL, set database.type and that backend's url; see Configuration.

The service reads the configuration as the bindizr user. Keep its installed ownership and permissions (0640 root:bindizr) when editing it.

4. Start Bindizr

# Start Bindizr service (the package already enabled it at boot)
sudo systemctl start bindizr

# Create and save an admin API token; its secret is shown once.
sudo bindizr token create admin --role admin

Use sudo for CLI commands on a package install: they require the daemon's user or root.

5. Configure the secondary

Follow the BIND setup to register the secondary and configure its catalog zone. Its example uses the same local ports as this guide. For another server, follow Knot DNS, NSD, PowerDNS, or another server.

After restarting the secondary, check the installation:

sudo bindizr doctor

A failing line names the piece; Troubleshooting has the fix for the common ones.

6. Create a zone and query it

# The zone starts with an apex NS record naming ns1.example.com, which a
# secondary needs before it will load the zone; --no-apex-ns leaves that to you.
sudo bindizr zone create example.com --mname ns1.example.com --rname admin@example.com
sudo bindizr record create example.com www --type A --value 192.0.2.1

# The secondary learned the zone through the catalog and pulled it; it answers on 53
dig @127.0.0.1 www.example.com A +short
# Expected answer: 192.0.2.1

# Which serial each secondary serves, against Bindizr's
sudo bindizr zone status example.com

The package also installs shell completions and man bindizr, so the command surface is reachable without the docs.

From here the CLI and the HTTP API cover the rest. To move zones from a name server you already run, see Migrating an Existing Primary.