Personally, I do not use DNS much at all except to do periodic bulk lookups for new domains I might visit.
I store all the DNS info I'll ever use[1] in .cdb files and also in my /etc/hosts file.
I do this for speed reasons, because HOSTS or tinydns on 127.xxx.xxx.xxx is always faster than DNS. But if I had an ISP like yours, it would be a necessity for other reasons.
Shaw is actually interfering with their customers' ability to lookup IP numbers. This is the most basic of all internet services.
And no one is complaining?
Anyway, you could do bulk lookups with TCP and then store the DNS info locally.
That could reduce if not elimibate your need for DNS.
I've always thought that there should be DNS servers that can handle pipelined TCP queries, and this is one reason why.
If the idea of bulk lookups and not using DNS otherwise sounds intriguing and you want some examples of scripts to do bulk lookups, e.g. for HN sites, let me know. It sounds like you could really benefit from reducing your dependence on DNS.
1. For example, all the IP addresses for sites that appear on HN.
I store all the DNS info I'll ever use[1] in .cdb files and also in my /etc/hosts file.
I do this for speed reasons, because HOSTS or tinydns on 127.xxx.xxx.xxx is always faster than DNS. But if I had an ISP like yours, it would be a necessity for other reasons.
Shaw is actually interfering with their customers' ability to lookup IP numbers. This is the most basic of all internet services.
And no one is complaining?
Anyway, you could do bulk lookups with TCP and then store the DNS info locally. That could reduce if not elimibate your need for DNS.
I've always thought that there should be DNS servers that can handle pipelined TCP queries, and this is one reason why.
If the idea of bulk lookups and not using DNS otherwise sounds intriguing and you want some examples of scripts to do bulk lookups, e.g. for HN sites, let me know. It sounds like you could really benefit from reducing your dependence on DNS.
1. For example, all the IP addresses for sites that appear on HN.