abrown38andClaude Opus 5.5
3c73afe0e1
The soa_warning for negative caching fired on the SOA minimum alone and blamed BIND's resolver cap (max-ncache-ttl), which doesn't apply to an authoritative zone. Resolvers cache negative answers for the smaller of the SOA minimum and the SOA record's TTL (RFC 2308 section 5), and the SOA record uses the zone's default TTL. The warning now uses that value, explains the effect, and suggests the fix command (with --view when the zone is in a view). Also: - Problem.String shows zone names without the trailing dot (jarld check). - jarl prints the warnings a change introduces when it is applied or staged, not only on dry runs. - jarl check/resync print only named-checkconf errors, not its "loaded serial" lines. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Jarl
A Jarl rules a Hold; this one rules your zones.
Jarl manages a BIND 9 (named) server: zones, records of every type, views, ACLs, TSIG keys and any named.conf option. It has a web UI, a REST API and a command line client. All three go through the same validated, audited, all-or-nothing change pipeline, and nothing reaches named before BIND's own checkers have accepted it.
$ jarl record add adbraun.lol nas A 192.168.1.20 --ptr
add nas.adbraun.lol. IN A 192.168.1.20
add 20.1.168.192.in-addr.arpa. IN PTR nas.adbraun.lol.
zone 1.168.192.in-addr.arpa serial 2026100700 -> 2026100701
zone adbraun.lol serial 2026100701 -> 2026100702
applied (changeset 12)
$ jarl record add adbraun.lol www A 192.168.1.99
error: www.adbraun.lol has a CNAME, so it can't have any other records (found A); a CNAME must be the only record at its name (RFC 1034) [zone adbraun.lol]
Features
- Everything in one place: primary, secondary, forward, stub, mirror, hint, redirect and in-view zones, reverse zones from a CIDR, split DNS with views, ACLs, TSIG keys, and every BIND 9.20 option at server, view, zone and top level, with the ARM's description and grammar built in.
- Safe changes. Every change is validated as a whole (CNAME rules,
glue, delegations, RRset TTLs, references, option syntax, open-resolver
and open-transfer lints), checked with
named-checkconf -z, installed atomically, reloaded, and verified withrndc zonestatus. If named doesn't load it, the previous files are put back. - Changesets: apply edits one at a time, or bundle them, review the diff, and apply them together. Every applied changeset can be reverted. Serials are bumped automatically.
- Users and API tokens with granular permissions, e.g. a token that may
only write
_acme-challengeTXT records in one zone. Passwords use argon2id, sessions have CSRF protection, logins are rate limited. - Audit log of every login, change and token, with user, token, IP and outcome.
- Let's Encrypt DNS-01 built in:
jarl acmeplus certbot and acme.sh hooks, including CNAME delegation to a dedicated ACME zone. - Adopts an existing server: imports named.conf and zone files (comments included), then switches named over with an automatic fallback.
- One static Go binary for the daemon (web UI embedded, SQLite built in) and one for the CLI, run by a sandboxed systemd service as an unprivileged user.
Quick start
On a Debian/Ubuntu BIND 9.20 server (install.md has the details):
make && sudo make install
sudo systemd-sysusers jarl.conf && sudo systemd-tmpfiles --create jarl.conf
sudo chgrp jarl /etc/jarl/jarl.yaml
sudo -u jarl jarld init --token # first admin + a CLI token
sudo -u jarl jarld import # read the current named.conf and zones
sudo jarld adopt # switch named over (keeps a backup, rolls back on failure)
sudo systemctl enable --now jarl
jarl config set server http://127.0.0.1:8053
jarl config set token # paste the token from 'jarld init'
jarl status
Then open the web UI at http://127.0.0.1:8053/, or set listen and tls
in /etc/jarl/jarl.yaml to reach it from your management network.
Documentation
| docs/concepts.md | How Jarl works: source of truth, changesets, the apply pipeline, authentication. Read this first |
| docs/install.md | Installing, importing and adopting an existing server, TLS, upgrading |
| docs/configuration.md | /etc/jarl/jarl.yaml reference |
| docs/cli.md | The jarl command line client |
| docs/api.md | REST API reference |
| docs/permissions.md | Users, tokens, grants and roles |
| docs/acme.md | Let's Encrypt DNS-01 with certbot and acme.sh |
| docs/validation.md | Every check Jarl makes |
| docs/operations.md | Backups, drift, failures, recovery, monitoring |
| docs/development.md | Code layout, tests against real BIND, conventions |
| CHANGELOG.md | Changes per release |
The web UI
The UI is built for getting things done rather than for looks. It has these pages:
- Dashboard: named status, adoption, drift, recent changes, open problems.
- Zones: list, create (fields adapt to the zone type), per-zone records with inline editing and type-specific hints, settings (SOA, TTL, serial policy, view), options, the generated zone file, and pasting a zone file to merge or replace records.
- Views, ACLs, TSIG keys, Server options: the options editor knows every BIND 9.20 statement for the scope and shows its description, grammar and a value field that fits it.
- Changes: pending edits with the diff, named-checkconf output and problems, applied as one changeset. History lists applied changesets with their diffs and a revert button.
- Audit, Users, Account (password, API tokens) and Search.
By default, edits are collected as pending changes. Pending rows are shown inline (green = new, yellow = changed, struck out = deleted) until you review and apply them. Switch on "Apply edits immediately" to skip the review step.
Requirements
- BIND 9.20, with
named-checkconf,named-checkzoneandrndc. The option catalog follows 9.20. 9.18 will probably work, because named-checkconf still checks every change, but it is untested. - Linux with systemd for the packaged service. Defaults match Debian/Ubuntu, and other layouts are configurable.
- Go 1.27+ to build.
Status
Version 0.1.0, the first release. It is feature-complete for one server's configuration. DNSSEC signing and managing several servers are not handled yet (concepts.md).