The default output from dig is pretty cluttered and doesn’t include all relevant information:

➜  dig chopmo.dk

; <<>> DiG 9.8.3-P1 <<>> chopmo.dk
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 64377
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 2, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;chopmo.dk.                     IN      A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
chopmo.dk.              3413    IN      A       192.30.252.153
chopmo.dk.              3413    IN      A       192.30.252.154

;; Query time: 142 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.1.3#53(192.168.1.3)
;; WHEN: Fri Dec  5 15:37:12 2014
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 59

What I usually want is

  • Information about all record types
  • Only the ANSWER section
  • To ask Google’s 8.8.8.8 DNS service

I can get this by adding some options to dig:

➜  dig ANY +noall +answer @8.8.8.8 chopmo.dk

chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      MX      10 chopmo.dk.
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      NS      ns1.gratisdns.dk.
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      NS      ns2.gratisdns.dk.
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      NS      ns3.gratisdns.dk.
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      NS      ns4.gratisdns.dk.
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      NS      ns5.gratisdns.dk.
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      SOA     ns1.gratisdns.dk. chopmo.gmail.com. 2014100601 10800 3600 2419000 43200
chopmo.dk.              21164   IN      TXT     "keybase-site-verification=d6tm8MiGvnBjtWQCJpBuXoD7R_C6UPCxKmA_DCMzdhk"
chopmo.dk.              3164    IN      A       192.30.252.153
chopmo.dk.              3164    IN      A       192.30.252.154

Since I always want these options to be used, I add them to my ~/.digrc:

➜  cat ~/.digrc

ANY +noall +answer @8.8.8.8