[thelist] isp dns caches not updating

[Liz Lawson]

>
>This is a proxy server thing, rather than
>a DNS thing. A proxy won't bother updating
>its records in some cases unless the page
>actually changes.


The new site has been re-done from the ground up: none of the old pages
exist on the new site, not even index.html ('cos it's index.php :) ). Come
to think of it, if it's a proxy server would the hits show up in the server
logs at all? The problem isn't that users are saying "we still see your old
site", it's that are server logs from the old site show that as recently as
today, requests for www.charitycards.co.uk are hitting the old site, which
must mean that something is still resolving to that IP address?

I can see this problem begin caused by a proxy server if it caches DNS
lookups, and when it checks for page changes it checks for changes at the IP
address, not the domain name. Is that a usual situation? (I can't belive
that the DNS cache would never be refreshed: I mean, people do change IP
tags, and won't always have access to their old space afterwards to change
the old pages. Of course, all those efficient web hosting companies might be
deleting dead sites as soon as the tag is switched...)

>Replace the front page of the old copy with
>a redirect to the numeric address of the new
>one, and set it to not cache.

I'm a bit scared of doing that in case it is a DNS problem, as the new site
contains links with the full URL. Even if they weren't bounced back when
they clicked one, the switch from the ip domain to the name domain one would
cause another session to be started...which leads to an interesting
e-commerce experience!

Could be that the razed-earth solution is the one to go with after all  -
eek!   :-0

thanks for your help

Liz