mDNSResponder(8)

NAME
mDNSResponder - Multicast DNS daemon

SYNOPSIS
mDNSResponder

DESCRIPTION
mDNSResponder (also known as mdnsd on some systems) is a daemon invoked at boot time to implement Multicast DNS and DNS Service Discovery.

mDNSResponder listens UDP port 5353 for Multicast DNS Query packets. When it receives a query for which it knows an answer, mDNSResponder issues the appropriate Multicast DNS Reply packet.

mDNSResponder also performs Multicast DNS Queries on behalf of client processes, and maintains a cache of the replies.

mDNSResponder has no user-specifiable command-line argument, and users should not run mDNSResponder manually.

To examine mDNSResponder's internal state, for debugging and disagnostic purposes, send it a SIGINFO signal, and it will then dump a snapshot summary of its internal state to /var/log/system.log, e.g.

    sudo killall -INFO mDNSResponder

FILES
/usr/sbin/mDNSResponder

SEE ALSO
mDNS(1)

For information on Multicast DNS, see http://www.multicastdns.org/

For information on DNS Service Discovery, see http://www.dns-sd.org/

For information on how to use the Multicast DNS and the DNS Service Discovery APIs on Mac OS X and other platforms, see http://developer.apple.com/bonjour/

For the source code to, see http://developer.apple.com/darwin/projects/bonjour/

BUGS
mDNSResponder bugs are tracked in Apple Radar component "mDNSResponder".

HISTORY
The mDNSResponder daemon first appeared in Mac OS X 10.2 (Jaguar).

Also available from the Darwin open source repository (though not officially supported by Apple) are mDNSResponder daemons for other platforms, including Mac OS 9, Microsoft Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, Solaris, and other POSIX systems.