BIND (DNS) issue

I guess he wants to access his website by only typing : http://domain.com

In this case, your zone file can be :

$ORIGIN .
$TTL 3h
domain.com IN SOA ns1.domain.com. dnsadmin.domain.com. ( ; the second field is a email address, the first dot is to be replaced by @
                       2003080501       ; serial - often a date... with a serial, don't forget to modify it each time you modify the zone (emacs can take care of it automatically)
                       3h      ; Refresh after 3 hours
                       1h      ; Retry after 1 hour
                       1w      ; Expire after 1 week
                       1h )    ; Negative caching TTL of 1 hour

;
; Name Servers
;

    IN NS   ns1.domain.com. ; you don't have to specify your domain here
    IN NS   ns2.domain.com. ; because it's following your SOA record where it's specified

    IN A xxx.xxx.xxx.242 ; address of the web server  : http://domain.com/

; to avoid .domain.com. on every line
$ORIGIN domain.com.

;
; Addresses for the canonical names
;

localhost  IN A    127.0.0.1
ns1         IN A    XXX.XXX.XXX.242 <-- real numbers in my file
ns2         IN A    XXX.XXX.XXX.32   <-- real numbers in my file

;
; Aliases
;

www        IN CNAME        ns1.domain.com.

2Holarius:
How does your solution differ from mine? :) Using a IN A instead of CNAME? :)

2Holarius:
More, you are using two IN A records pointing to the same ip address. IMHO, it is not a good practice.

i added "domain.com. IN CNAME ns1.domain.com" as the last line of the file and restarted my dns server, that should update immediately shouldn't it (i mean for me, internally).  i still get an error when i type "nslookup domain.com MYdnsserverIP"

[root@ns1 root]# nslookup domain.com
Note:  nslookup is deprecated and may be removed from future releases.
Consider using the `dig' or `host' programs instead.  Run nslookup with
the `-sil[ent]' option to prevent this message from appearing.
Server:         XXX.XXX.XXX.171
Address:        XXX.XXX.XXX.171#53

** server can't find domain.com: SERVFAIL

[root@ns1 root]#


any other ideas?

@     A     xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx     <---- works great as the last line of the file, thanks

one more question, if you don't mind.  is that an abbreviation, if so, what would be the unabbreviated line?

i didn't see that in "DNS and Bind", where should the line be placed in the file (logically)?

as far as I remember @ is an abbreviation for the current $ORIGIN
full line should be :

domain.com.    A    xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

With its final dot, I think this line can be placed almost everywhere in the file.

2 S0lar:
It seems that bind does not like CNAME for a domain... I've just checked :

[root@tabr named]# named-checkzone dune dune2.zone
dns_master_load: dune2.zone:13: dune: CNAME and other data
dns_master_load: dune2.zone:13: dune: CNAME and other data
dns_master_load: dune2.zone:13: dune: CNAME and other data
zone dune/IN: loading master file dune2.zone: CNAME and other data

Although I dislike to have A records with the same addresses, it seems that we've not further choice :-/

Holarius, it appears that your example worked after all.  I didn't try it after SOlar said it was the same as his (his was easier to read since it wasn't the whole file again).  My apologies for not awarding you the points as you were the first to provide an answer.  

Here's the points I owe you.
http://www.experts-exchange.com/Networking/Linux_Networking/Q_20700736.html

> @     A     xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx     <---- works great as the last line of the file, thanks
> one more question, if you don't mind.  is that an abbreviation, if so, what would be the unabbreviated line?
That's right, it's an abbreviation. It is the same as
"domain.com.    IN   A     xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx"
but less typing.

> where should the line be placed in the file (logically)?
Anywhere after SOA record. This does not really play a role as long as you don't have another line overriding it.