Summary
Campus VPN uses Campus DNS for name resolution as it authoritatively manages public namespace for *.msu.edu. To make DNS names resolvable by Campus VPN clients, the hostname must be resolvable by either Campus DNS or the general public Internet.
Body
Overview
Campus VPN uses Campus DNS for name resolution as it authoritatively manages public namespace for *.msu.edu.
Additional private DNS trees may exist under the *.msu.edu namespace; however, as they are private and not public, the Campus VPN cannot resolve those DNS hostnames.
- Examples of a private namespace would be a Microsoft Active Directory configured to use ad.msu.edu as the domain. Although domain-joined PCs and servers would be able to resolve hostnames, such as fileserver.ad.msu.edu, using domain controllers, the domain names would not be accessible outside of the Active Directory environment. It would not be possible to resolve fileserver.ad.msu.edu from the public Internet.
- The same problem is also true when using an alternative TLD, such as *.local. There is no global public DNS tree for *.local, thus it would be impossible to resolve *.local domain names from the public Internet.
Solution
To make DNS names resolvable by Campus VPN clients, the hostname must be resolvable by either Campus DNS or the general public Internet.
If your system or application uses a private DNS tree, ask your domain administrator if its possible to link the domain to Campus DNS.
If you are domain administrator of a private DNS namespace, you may be able to link your DNS tree to Campus DNS. Contact hostmaster@msu.edu for more information.