What's New at DNSimple — Summer 2024
Anthony Eden
on
We're back again with the Summer 2024 Feature Focus to keep you up to date on all the latest from DNSimple. Over the past few months, we've made a lot of improvements and adjustments and implemented some helpful feedback from our customers.
In this edition, you'll find improvements to the Domain Control Plane, the addition of Null MX records, deprecation of alternate TXT records for ALIAS (if you use those, keep an eye on the timeline), and updates to our Terraform Provider to increase your domain security.
Read on for what we've changed, click any of the links to learn more, and, as always, if you're not using DNSimple yet, try us free for 30 days, and let us simplify your DNS management.
Domain Control Plane improvements
Our most recent updates unified your DNS record editor experience with a single record editor to manage everything. We also discontinued GoDaddy domain registration via DNSimple due to recent API changes on GoDaddy's end, and adjusted the integration management for our Route53 and Azure Integrated DNS Providers to fine-tune the overall experience.
DNSimple's Domain Control Plane gives you clarity around the entirety of your domain and DNS portfolio, and lets you manage it all through a single unified API and UI. We're continuing to add more Integrated Providers, and we'd love to hear which ones you'd like included — let us know.
Adding Null MX records
Null MX records allow users to enter only a . in the Exchange field — previously impossible due to validation logic that prevented empty hostnames. This indicates that a particular domain doesn't accept email, which enhances security by reducing attack vectors, like bounce messages or undelivered reports, and improves overall email system efficiency.
Deprecating alternate TXT records
We've noticed alternate TXT records are often considered an unwanted side effect instead of a useful aid, so we're deprecating alternate TXT records for ALIAS. Our system will no longer produce or update the additional record, but you can continue publishing them using our API or UI.
We made this announcement on May 3, 2024, and are approaching phase 3 of the process:
Phase 3 (stop updates): Starting August 1st, 2024, any action on the ALIAS record will no longer be reflected on any alternate TXT record. You will only be able to delete them, and you will not be able to update them.
If you use our API via custom code, we recommend auditing your custom code around ALIAS record creation, update, and deletion for any cases that may be handling the alternate TXT record.
Terraform provider updates
Recent updates to our Terraform Provider increase domain security, helping you prevent unwelcome surprises, track changes, and further secure your domains against unauthorized changes and theft.
The registrant_change_check data source lets you determine if your TLD requires any extended attributes for contact changes and tells you if a contact change will trigger a trade. It's a game-changer for anyone needing to understand the intricacies of specific top-level domain (TLD) requirements for contact changes.
The dnsimple_registered_domain resource's contact_id attribute lets you initiate and track contact changes as part of your resource management. This ensures contact updates are part of your Terraform configuration, making your domain management more robust and less prone to errors.
Implementing your ideas
Our updates to null MX records and the deprecation of alternate TXT records for ALIAS are a direct result of customer feedback, and we love being able to implement your ideas as part of continually improving DNSimple.
We want to give a huge thanks to all our clients, especially the developers, operators, and API consumers who have provided feedback over the years — your ideas are invaluable. If there's ever something you want to see us add, let us know. We always appreciate hearing what features and improvements would make your lives easier.
If you're not using DNSimple yet, give us a try free for 30 days, and experience our best-in-class DNS management for yourself. Want to talk more about how we can help meet your domain and DNS management needs? Get in touch, we'd love to chat.
Anthony Eden
I break things so Simone continues to have plenty to do. I occasionally have useful ideas, like building a domain and DNS provider that doesn't suck.
We think domain management should be easy.
That's why we continue building DNSimple.
