Service & Support
Nameserver configuration
In order to register a domain, nic.at requires at least two correctly configured name servers. The configuration is also checked during each proximate modification of data. Errors in name server configuration result in the rejection of domain applications. The check categories for name server checks are described under the heading automatic application check.
DNS Software
The most popular domain name server (DNS) software is BIND, which manages the DNS service within the network. The operating systems of many name servers are based on various Unix derivates. Ports of newer BIND versions (8.x and 9.x) for Windows NT or 2000 are also available. As a principle, the latest BIND version should be installed (as for any software), because newer versions usually take into account safety gaps and other problems.
Reading on the topic: name-servers
Current versions of BIND are available at:
http://www.isc.org/products/BIND/ 
Their configuration is described at
http://www.nominum.com/content/documents/bind9arm.pdf
The standard work for DNS and BIND is: DNS and BIND by Paul Albitz and Cricket Lio (4th edition, April 2001)
The following links provide further information:
RIPE - Simple DNS Configuration Example
http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/dns-example.html
RIPE - Recommendations for DNS SOA Values
http://www.ripe.net/ripe/docs/dns-soa.html
New nameserver-check of registry
(documentation & software download)
In the course of release 2.0 of the registry software, new nameserver-checks were implemented. These nameserver-checks can be externally preprocessed with registry-ident nameserver-rules using following supplied software:
Documentation:
nameservercheck_neues_release_2005-version_1.0_eng.pdf 
Software:
dnscheck-0.1.tgz
Related Links
Related FAQ
What are the technical reasons for the rejection of a domain application?
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There are various reasons why an application may be rejected: errors in the application itself (incomplete field descriptions, missing mandatory fields, invalid version etc.), invalid domain names, wrong entry formats, invalid characters. The most frequent source of error is an incorrect nameserver configuration. Please click here for more information about the application check and nameserver configuration.
How often are the nic.at nameservers reloaded?
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6 times a day: at 6am, 10am, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm and 10pm (CET).
What does IDN mean?
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IDN is for "Internationalized Domain Name", which is a standard that enables the use of other characters in addition to the currently allowed ASCII-characters (the 26 Latin letters, the ten numbers 0 – 9 and the hyphen) for domain names. The respective registry decides which additional characters are allowed with the implementation of IDN.