Questions[cname-record](server)

I have 2 domains hosted with different hosts. I need to redirect Domain A to Domain B. Unfortunately I can't do a 301 redirect from Host A, but can only modify/add DNS entries (A-Records and CNAMEs) at Host A.

Surely it is possible to redirect www.DomainA.com to www.DomainB.com using only A-records and CNAMEs?

At present, the DNS entries are:

DomainA.com.    3600    IN    SOA       ns1.HostA.net.
www             3600    IN    CNAME     www.DomainB.com.    
DomainA.com.    3600    IN    NS        ns1.HostA.net.  
DomainA.com.    3600    IN    NS        ns2.HostA.net.  
DomainA.com.    3600    IN    NS        ns3.HostA.net.

I want to redirect

DomainA.com -> DomainB.com
*.DomainA.com -> *.DomainB.com

I've tried the suggestion from this other post but it didn't work.

How can I achieve this only with A-Records and CNAMEs please? Thank you for your advice.

Prembo.

Is it allowed in DNS to have a CNAME record that points to another CNAME record?

The reason we need this is that we have a hostname that we want to be looked up to the IP address of our web server computer. We also have another web server computer stand by that could be activated in case the first one would die. In such a case we would quickly need to point the hostname to the IP address of the stand by web server computer.

Unfortunately the hostname resides in a DNS domain where any change would take long time due to manual operation dependent on other sysadmins. But we have another DNS domain where we can perform the changes ourselves quickly. Having CNAME to CNAME chain seems like a possible solution. But is it allowed? Will web browsers understand it?

I manage multiple websites that currently have the following DNS configuration:

example.com      - A Record - Production Server IP
test.example.com - A Record - Test Server IP
www.example.com  - CNAME    - example.com
beta.example.com - CNAME    - test.example.com
dev.example.com  - CNAME    - test.example.com

Is this an appropriate use of CNAME records? I've looked online and have not found a clear answer. Some people claim that CNAME records are bad (they are not, however, clear on why this is) and propose the following setup:

example.com      - A Record - Production Server IP
test.example.com - A Record - Test Server IP
www.example.com  - A Record - Production Server IP
beta.example.com - A Record - Test Server IP
dev.example.com  - A Record - Test Server IP

Which one of these is the better approach (and why)?

Note: The subdomains do not require their own MX records, so that is not an issue here.

Is it possible to enter some sort of CNAME record or alias in the windows hosts file (C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts)?

Basically I want to forward all requests made to host A to host B, without having to hard code the IP address (which changes frequently).

I know it's valid to have a DNS A record that's a wildcard (e.g. *.mysite.com). Is it possible/valid/advised to have a wildcard CNAME record?