Names and DNS records

Claim a name

A name is your piece of one of our zones (mesh-net.space, mesh-net.online, mesh-net.site), for example myhome.mesh-net.space. You take it in two steps: first find a free one, then decide on its page what it does.

1. Open Domains in the menu and press Add name at the top right: a search field opens under the header.
2. Type the name you want (myhome) and press Check. The list shows the name in every zone: free, yours or taken (in use — it is the address of a network or of a published service). When the name is taken somewhere, Similar free names below offer close variants that are free.
3. Press Take next to the one you like. The name is yours at once, still without DNS records, and you land on its page.
4. On the name's page, choose what it does — see Use the name.

Each name appears in the list with its records; a click on the name opens its page: there you add more records, edit or delete them and set up dynamic DNS. When all the names of your account are in use, the search still shows what is free, but Take waits until you free a name or get more (Limits).

Use the name

A name you have just taken has no records: it is reserved for you, and nothing is published in DNS. Its page offers what it can do:

• A DNS record — Add a DNS record (or Add record at the top): an A record to a server, a CNAME to another site, MX for mail and so on (Record types). The first record takes the place of the reservation.
• Dynamic DNS — the name follows the changing IP of a mesh device or of your router: DDNS.
• The address of a network — Address of a network: a new private network gets a free reserved name as its address; an existing network moves to it in its settings (Change the address).
• A published service — Publish a service: on a network's Publishing tab, pick the name as the public address of a route (reverse-proxy).

The address of a network and a published service need the name free of records — exactly as it is right after Take.

Which names you can take

• Latin letters, digits, hyphens, underscores and dots: myhome, nas.myhome, _dmarc.myhome. Capital letters become lowercase.
• A branch has one owner. A name with dots belongs to the branch of its last part: nas.myhome, www.myhome and _acme-challenge.myhome are all in the branch myhome. Once myhome (or any name under it) is yours, nobody else can add names to that branch — and you can't add names to a branch that belongs to someone else.
• Names that start with “_” right under the zone belong to mesh-net. Put such records under your own name: _dmarc.myhome, not _dmarc.
• These first-level names are reserved: admin, api, app, chat, ftp, hs, mail, ns, ns1, ns2, panel, smtp, www.
• The root of a zone (@, the zone itself) is not available.
• A name that already serves as the address of a private network is taken.

Record types

• One record of each type per name. A second A record for the same name isn't added — edit the existing one instead. Two TXT values for one name are not possible either; on your own domain they are.
• A CNAME must be the only record of its name: don't combine it with A, MX or TXT on the same name.
• Records of names in our zones have a TTL of 300 seconds.

Examples

Reserve a name without records

A name you take (Claim a name) is reserved: it is yours, but nothing is published in DNS. The list shows it as reserved (no address). On the name's page:

• an A or AAAA record with an empty value waits for an address from dynamic DNS — a mesh device or your router fills it in;
• clearing the value of a record returns the name to the reserved state.

A reserved name is what a private network needs for its address: a free name with no DNS records.

Edit and delete records

1. Open the name: click it in the list on Domains. The table DNS records lists its records with their status: published (in DNS), pending (saved, not in DNS yet) or reserved.
2. The pencil in a record's row (Edit) opens a small form right under it: change the type or the value and press Save. An empty value reserves the name again and removes the record from DNS.
3. The bin (Delete) removes the record after a confirmation. When the last record of a name is deleted, the name is free again and leaves your list.
4. Add record at the top of the name's page adds a record of another type to the same name.

A name that is the address of one of your private networks, or its second address, is shown read-only: its record is kept by mesh-net and leads the network's devices to their server. To free the name, give the network another address and remove this one in its settings, or delete the network.

The same goes for a name you publish a service on over HTTP/S: while the route exists, mesh-net keeps the name's record, which leads visitors to the network's server. To free the name, delete the route; the record keeps pointing at that server until you change it.

Limits

• Every account holds 3 names (the dashboard calls them domains) for free — the same for everyone; the administrator may add more to an account. The counter at the top right of Domains shows the use, like Domains 1/3; Get more next to it offers the pack below.
• A name counts once however many record types it has. myhome and nas.myhome are two names. Your own domain counts as one name.
• The pack +5 domains raises the limit by 5 for a year for 149 ₽. Packs stack with the free names and with each other: one more pack adds 5 more names and moves the packs' shared end date by a year. You buy it on the same page.
• What happens to names over the limit when a pack ends: Which names go first.

How fast changes appear

Our name servers publish a record the moment you save it. Resolvers that asked for the name before may keep the old answer until its TTL (300 seconds) runs out. To check what DNS says right now:

dig +short myhome.mesh-net.space A
nslookup myhome.mesh-net.space

A record stuck in pending was saved but didn't reach DNS: save it again a bit later, and if it stays there, write to support.