System Requirements

BindCaptain system requirements and compatibility information.

Supported Distributions

Fully Supported (Automated Setup)

Distribution	Version	Package Manager	Status
RHEL	8.x, 9.x	dnf/yum	✅ Full
CentOS	8.x, 9.x	dnf/yum	✅ Full
Rocky Linux	8.x, 9.x	dnf/yum	✅ Full
AlmaLinux	8.x, 9.x	dnf/yum	✅ Full
Fedora	35+	dnf	✅ Full

Manual Setup Required

Distribution	Version	Package Manager	Status
Ubuntu	20.04+	apt	⚠️ Manual
Debian	11+	apt	⚠️ Manual
Arch Linux	Latest	pacman	⚠️ Manual
openSUSE	15+	zypper	⚠️ Manual

Hardware Requirements

Minimum Requirements

CPU: 1 core, 1.0 GHz
RAM: 512 MB
Storage: 1 GB free space
Network: Ethernet connection

Recommended Requirements

CPU: 2 cores, 2.0 GHz
RAM: 2 GB
Storage: 5 GB free space
Network: Gigabit Ethernet

Software Prerequisites

Required Packages

DNF/YUM Distributions (Automated)

# These are automatically installed by system-setup.sh
podman
bind
bind-utils
bind-chroot
firewalld
policycoreutils-python-utils

APT Distributions (Manual)

# Install manually on Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y podman bind9 bind9utils firewalld

Pacman Distributions (Manual)

# Install manually on Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S podman bind firewalld

Optional Packages

dig/nslookup: For DNS testing
tcpdump: For network debugging
htop: For system monitoring

Network Requirements

Ports

Port	Protocol	Purpose	Required
53	TCP/UDP	DNS queries	✅ Yes
953	TCP	BIND control	✅ Yes

Firewall Configuration

BindCaptain automatically configures firewalld:

# DNS service
firewall-cmd --add-service=dns --permanent
firewall-cmd --reload

Security Requirements

SELinux

SELinux is automatically configured for container operations:

# Container file contexts
setsebool -P container_manage_cgroup on
setsebool -P container_use_cephfs on

User Permissions

Root access required for system setup
Container runtime access for Podman operations
Network binding privileges for port 53

Container Runtime

Podman Requirements

Version: 3.0+ recommended
Rootless: Not supported (requires port 53)
Storage: Local storage driver

Container Image

Base: Rocky Linux 9
BIND Version: 9.16+
Size: ~200 MB compressed

Storage Requirements

Configuration Directory

/opt/bindcaptain/
├── config/           # DNS configuration files
├── zones/            # Zone files
├── logs/             # BIND logs
└── data/             # BIND data files

Disk Space

Base installation: 100 MB
Container image: 200 MB
Zone files: Variable (depends on DNS zones)
Logs: Variable (depends on query volume)

Performance Considerations

DNS Query Load

Queries/Second	CPU Usage	Memory Usage
100	< 5%	< 100 MB
1,000	< 15%	< 200 MB
10,000	< 50%	< 500 MB

Zone File Size

Zones	Records	Memory Usage
10	1,000	~ 50 MB
100	10,000	~ 200 MB
1,000	100,000	~ 1 GB

Compatibility Matrix

BIND Versions

BIND Version	Status	Notes
9.16	✅ Supported	Minimum required
9.18	✅ Supported	Recommended
9.20	✅ Supported	Latest stable

Container Runtimes

Runtime	Status	Notes
Podman 3.0+	✅ Supported	Primary runtime
Docker	⚠️ Limited	Not officially supported

Unsupported Configurations

Not Supported

Rootless containers (requires port 53)
Docker runtime (use Podman)
IPv6-only networks (IPv4 required)
Windows/macOS hosts (Linux only)

Limited Support

Custom BIND configurations (use templates)
Multiple BIND instances (single instance only)
Cluster deployments (single node only)

Manual Setup

For unsupported distributions, see the Manual Setup Guide for detailed installation instructions.

Need help? Check the Troubleshooting Guide or Installation Guide.