Plugins: dnsdist as a plugin

[dkowis]

dnsdist is a fantastic dns loadbalancing tool, capable of serving requests as DNScrypt or dns-tls, or dns over https.

It's got some significant anti-abuse configuration, as well as the ability to healthcheck and verify upstream dns.

Configuration is kinda advanced tho, so it might just be exposed as a simple text editor for the LUA configuration. Not sure if it's best to just opt for a package by itself, instead of integrated with the UI.

Alternatives

dnscrypt-proxy, ha-proxy for balancing DNS servers, but neither alone, nor combined, offer the same functionality that dnsdist does, as they're more general.

Thanks!

[craSH]

I added my vote for this, and would encourage considering it in place of the listed alternatives - dnsdist is fairly unique and powerful compared to dnscrypt-proxy and haproxy.

[rcmcronny]

+1 for dnsdist

[AdSchellevis]

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[dkowis]

What does one need to do to make this a plugin?

There's a BSD package already: https://dnsdist.org/install.html

The Contributing document doesn't tell me much about making the plugin. Is there something I could look at? I might have some time coming up.

[mimugmail]

First you need to build a pkg for it:

opnsense-code ports
cd /usr/ports/dns/dnsdist/ && make install clean

When you successfully build and installed it you can follow the public guides here:
https://docs.opnsense.org/develop.html

Easiest would be to clone an existing plugin and do search+replace:
https://www.routerperformance.net/opnsense/plugin-development/