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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-13T14:48:41+00:00

Although it’s true that some recursive-nameserver configurations are (sloppily) referred to as caching, e.g.,

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Although it’s true that some
recursive-nameserver configurations
are (sloppily) referred to as
“caching”, e.g., by
RHEL/Fedora/CentOS, that’s a really
bad name for that function — because
caching is orthogonal to recursion.

Theoretically, you could write a
nameserver that does recursive service
but doesn’t cache its results. (That
would be a bit perverse, and I don’t
know of any.) Conversely, nameserver
packages that cache but know nothing
about how to recurse and instead do
less-helpful alternative iterative
service are common: dnsmasq, pdnsd,
etc. … …

Above text source: http://linuxgazette.net/170/lan.html

Please explain what does the author means by “caching is orthogonal to recursion” ?

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    caching is orthogonal to recursion?

    Caching doesn’t require/imply recursion.

    The term “orthogonal” is meant to be interpreted from a mathematical sense loosely has “the things have nothing in common i.e. separate concepts”.

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