Please add setting to enable/disable DNS forwarder

[Brendan Griffin]

Precise is now using DNSmasq for DNS forwarding. But no setting is apparent for disabling this forwarder for users who do not want it.

The UbuntuBrainstorm asking for this feature said that users should be able to turn it on/off: http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/28926/

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

Setting this as Triaged now is a little reaching, but I can definitely confirm that there is no such option right now in gnome-control-center, and that this might be the right thing to do (with some design guidance). Definitely something to look into for 12.10.

At this point however, and with 12.04 that does ship dnsmasq, there won't be such an option just yet. *However*, dnsmasq is also being started with caching *disabled*, on purpose. dnsmasq's DNS cache is global for all users, so activating such cache presents a potential security vulnerability, which prompted for it to be disabled.

After rework of the actual method of caching at the dnsmasq level or by using a different tool, with per-user caching being available, we might then be able to enable caching by default. At this point providing a way to toggle such a feature will be useful.

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

Ah, this part is relevant though; disabling dnsmasq at this point is simple, for those who don't wish to use dnsmasq for DNS resolution in 12.04:

Edit /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf:

Remove or comment out the line "dns=dnsmasq".

[Brendan Griffin (brenfar)]

Thanks so much for this tip Mathieu! really appreciate it.

I did see that reference in the blueprint but I didn't know which line to comment out.

[Charles Peters II (cp)]

When they were talking about doing this ill conceived notion, it was supposed to be documented how to disable it: https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/foundations-p-dns-resolving

stgraber 2011-12-13:
 - After discussion with mdeslaur, we'll still turn on dnsmasq by
default in Network Manager but document how to turn it off (comment
the dns= line in /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf).

Why this was done on a LTS release was very unwise in my opinion!

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

This bug concerns the caching or not of dnsmasq. We may want to consider enabling/disabling dnsmasq along with it in a more user-friendly way, but for now editing the configuration file works, because this works well out of the box for the vast majority of people.

This bug is still open -- I'm keeping it open because toggling caching (and enabling it in the OS, really) *is* something we want to track, but couldn't possibly do for Precise.

[worldmind (ashrub)]

> but for now editing the configuration file works

What configuration file I must edit for enable dns caching (/etc/dnsmasq.conf does not exist)?
I want fast and stable DNS resolving and I am not afraid global DNS cache because there are no another users on my computer.

[Brendan Griffin (brenfar)]

Commenting out DNSmasq works for me. I'm satisfied just being able to comment out DNSmasq.

[Thomas Hood (jdthood)]

I changed the title to make this a wish for an easy way to enable/disable nm-dnsmasq. Many people have to disable nm-dnsmasq (myself included) and they shouldn't be forced to edit configuration files in order to do so.