PowerDNS Authoritative

This playbook provisions NetActuate virtual servers and configures them as PowerDNS authoritative nameservers. Use this for hosting your own authoritative DNS infrastructure across multiple NetActuate locations.

Provisioning Playbook

---
- hosts: localhost
  connection: local
  gather_facts: false

  vars:
    api_key: "{{ lookup('env', 'NETACTUATE_API_KEY') }}"
    dns_plan: "VR2048x2x40"
    dns_image: "ubuntu-24.04"
    dns_locations:
      - ashburn
      - amsterdam
      - tokyo

  tasks:
    - name: Create PowerDNS servers
      netactuate.cloud.server:
        api_key: "{{ api_key }}"
        hostname: "pdns-auth-{{ item }}"
        plan: "{{ dns_plan }}"
        location: "{{ item }}"
        image: "{{ dns_image }}"
        state: present
      loop: "{{ dns_locations }}"
      register: dns_servers

    - name: Add servers to in-memory inventory
      add_host:
        name: "{{ item.ip_address }}"
        groups: pdns_servers
      loop: "{{ dns_servers.results }}"

Configuration Playbook

---
- hosts: pdns_servers
  become: true
  gather_facts: true

  vars:
    pdns_api_key: "{{ lookup('env', 'PDNS_API_KEY') }}"
    pdns_version: "4.8"

  tasks:
    - name: Install PowerDNS repository
      apt:
        name: apt-transport-https
        state: present
        update_cache: true

    - name: Install PowerDNS Authoritative Server
      apt:
        name:
          - pdns-server
          - pdns-backend-pgsql
        state: present

    - name: Install PostgreSQL
      apt:
        name:
          - postgresql
          - postgresql-client
          - python3-psycopg2
        state: present

    - name: Create PowerDNS database
      become_user: postgres
      postgresql_db:
        name: pdns
        state: present

    - name: Create PowerDNS database user
      become_user: postgres
      postgresql_user:
        db: pdns
        name: pdns
        password: "{{ pdns_db_password }}"
        priv: ALL

    - name: Initialize PowerDNS schema
      become_user: postgres
      command: psql -d pdns -f /usr/share/doc/pdns-backend-pgsql/schema.pgsql.sql
      args:
        creates: /etc/pdns/schema_initialized

    - name: Mark schema as initialized
      file:
        path: /etc/pdns/schema_initialized
        state: touch

    - name: Configure PowerDNS
      copy:
        dest: /etc/pdns/pdns.conf
        content: |
          setuid=pdns
          setgid=pdns
          launch=gpgsql
          gpgsql-host=127.0.0.1
          gpgsql-dbname=pdns
          gpgsql-user=pdns
          gpgsql-password={{ pdns_db_password }}

          api=yes
          api-key={{ pdns_api_key }}
          webserver=yes
          webserver-address=0.0.0.0
          webserver-port=8081
          webserver-allow-from=0.0.0.0/0

          local-address=0.0.0.0
          local-port=53

          default-soa-content=ns1.example.com hostmaster.example.com 0 10800 3600 604800 3600
          default-ttl=3600
        mode: "0600"
        owner: pdns
        group: pdns
      notify: Restart PowerDNS

    - name: Start and enable PowerDNS
      systemd:
        name: pdns
        state: started
        enabled: true

  handlers:
    - name: Restart PowerDNS
      systemd:
        name: pdns
        state: restarted

Adding Zones

After deployment, use the PowerDNS API to add zones:

curl -X POST http://pdns-server:8081/api/v1/servers/localhost/zones \
  -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_PDNS_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "name": "example.com.",
    "kind": "Native",
    "nameservers": [
      "ns1.example.com.",
      "ns2.example.com."
    ]
  }'

Multi-Location DNS

Deploying PowerDNS across multiple NetActuate locations provides:

• Geographic redundancy for your DNS infrastructure
• Lower latency for DNS queries from different regions
• High availability if one location becomes unreachable

Combine this setup with NetActuate anycast to advertise a single IP for your nameservers across all locations.

Need Help?

If you need assistance deploying PowerDNS, visit our support page.