3. Updates to RFCs

3.1. Updates to RFC 1034

This document clarifies possible ambiguities in [RFC1034] that did not clearly distinguish Empty Non-Terminal (ENT) names ([RFC7719]) from nonexistent names, and it refers to subsequent documents that do. ENTs are nodes in the DNS that do not have resource record sets associated with them but have descendant nodes that do. The correct response to ENTs is NODATA (i.e., a response code of NOERROR and an empty answer section). Additional clarifying language on these points is provided in Section 7.16 of [RFC2136] and in Sections 2.2.2 and 2.2.3 of [RFC4592].

3.2. Updates to RFC 2308

The second paragraph of Section 5 in [RFC2308] states the following:

A negative answer that resulted from a name error (NXDOMAIN) should be cached such that it can be retrieved and returned in response to another query for the same <QNAME, QCLASS> that resulted in the cached negative response.

This document revises that paragraph to the following:

A negative answer that resulted from a name error (NXDOMAIN) should be cached such that it can be retrieved and returned in response to another query for the same <QNAME, QCLASS> that resulted in the cached negative response, or where the QNAME is a descendant of the original QNAME and the QCLASS is the same.

Section 2 above elaborates on the revised rule and specifies when it may be reasonable to relax or ignore it.