I'm running a bind9 server on Gentoo.

I have two domain names setup. If I go into nslookup, it will find any server name i hand to it. The problem I'm having is it's refusing to recognize the MX records I put in. If I go into nslookup, instruct it to use my dns server, set it's type to mx and enter the domain name it never comes back with anything. Below is the domain I setup for my internal network.

$ttl 38400
collective.local. IN SOA cube02.shadowrealms.cc. awilisch.net-collective.net. (
1169585355
10800
3600
604800
38400 )
collective.local. IN NS cube02.shadowrealms.cc.
cube04.collective.local. IN A 10.1.70.68
cube02.collective.local. IN A 10.1.70.60
mythtv1.collective.local. IN A 10.1.70.80
mail01.collective.local. IN A 10.1.70.68
mail02.collective.local. IN A 10.1.70.80
mail01.collective.local. IN MX 10 mail01.collective.local
mail02.collective.local. IN MX 9 mail02.collective.local

Doing a dig on the domain names shows the question, but never an answer section. Doing a dig on another domain name just as a test will show the appropriate mail server. I'm unsure what I'm doing wrong. The setups were done using webmin 1.30. From examples I've found on other websites everything looks like it's correct, but the mx records still are not working.

As far as the domain name I'm using goes, this is for internal use only. I do have another registered domain name that I setup on another gentoo server and I was getting the same results that I got above so I don't think it's the domain name.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

--Aric

Your zone file is unusable. You have 2 entries for mail01.collective.local., and the first is the A record, so you won't get to your MX record, which is also malformed.

It should look like this:

Also, you won't get much useful DNS info out of nslookup. It is a horrible tool, without many options that you will want for looking up DNS info. The linux tool is dig. Running:

on the DNS server will give better info than nslookup. Read the manpages on dig, it is a very robust tool with many options to it.

Peace,
JimBass

That zone file actually looks pretty much OK to me. You are missing the periods at the end of your MX record values, though (that's broken).

Oh, actually you're not understanding how MX records are supposed to work. You need it in the format:
domain.com. IN MX # mailhost.

Fixing your MX records would be...