Linux: Setting UP DNS Cache server

1. The DNS servers in a network may be with huge traffic or it might have more downtime resulting in failure of resolving domain names.

2. May be a dialup machine has very slow internet connection where resolving a DNS query might take more time.

The solution for both the problems is to have a caching DNS server. Installing a dnsmasq and running it as a service on local host will resolve the issue.

Steps to Setup DNS Cache Server
(Following lines works good in Fedora / Redhat / CentOS)

Install dnsmasq
$ yum install dnsmasq

Make dnsmasq start on boot
$ chkconfig dnsmasq on

Start dnsmasq immediately
$ service dnsmasq start

Change the network setting to work through this cache server


Open the network settings

Add the Primary DNS as localhost by adding 127.0.0.1
Move the primary and secondary to secondary and tertiary.
Click File->Save

Restart the network
$ service network restart

Test the network DNS resolving speed after the first time access to the site. It will be much faster as it comes from local.