The Path to Resolverless DNS
There is an intriguing mention of “Server Push” in the specification of DNS over HTTPS (DoH) (RFC 8484). The RFC is somewhat vague in the description of server push, apart from noting a caveat that “extra care must be taken to ensure that the pushed URI is one that the client would have directed the same query to if the client had initiated the request (in addition to the other security checks normally needed for server push).”
It’s a somewhat elliptical reference to an intriguing possibility that a HTTPS server could deliver one or more DNS HTTP objects that contain both query and answer sections without the client ever making the DNS request/query to the server in the first place. It seems like an approach that is totally alien to the DNS as we know it, so it might be useful to ask: How did we get to this point where this resolverless form of DNS name resolution makes some sense? And, to whom does it make sense?
“Classic” DNS