Cannot access the RCODE returned by the DNS server

Hi again haha :)

I found out that I need to know if a domain exists or not. According to the RFC 1035, it's the RCODE value that gives me this answer and can be one of :

https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1035
RCODE           Response code - this 4 bit field is set as part of
                responses.  The values have the following
                interpretation:

                0               No error condition

                1               Format error - The name server was
                                unable to interpret the query.

                2               Server failure - The name server was
                                unable to process this query due to a
                                problem with the name server.

                3               Name Error - Meaningful only for
                                responses from an authoritative name
                                server, this code signifies that the
                                domain name referenced in the query does
                                not exist.

                4               Not Implemented - The name server does
                                not support the requested kind of query.

                5               Refused - The name server refuses to
                                perform the specified operation for
                                policy reasons.  For example, a name
                                server may not wish to provide the
                                information to the particular requester,
                                or a name server may not wish to perform
                                a particular operation (e.g., zone

I read the code and saw you extract the $rcode at line 515 in DNSQuery.php for debug purposes :
$rcode = $this->header['spec'] & 15;
And never integrate it to DNSResult or DNSAnswer.

Is-it possible to add such data in the DNSAnswer object ? (I don't think the DNSResult need it)
In fact, I only need the raw data (but I'm not saying that a little enumeration could be really cool haha).

Welcome back :) I think this seems like a nice enhancement so I'll add it to the queue.

@Legendary4226

This has been addressed in the rcode branch #28 and merged back into master.

The DNSAnswer object now has the following methods:

DNSAnswer::setRcode(int): void sets the RCODE, DNSAnswer::getRCode():int returns the RCODE from the transaction (RCODE is initialised as -1 as a sanity check). DNSAnswer::getRcodeDescription(): string returns a brief textual status of the current RCODE (decided this was cleaner than creating a new class to store but could be re-factored).

Example test code:

$server = "dns0.verrotech.com";
$query = new DNSQuery($server, 53, 60, true);

$a = $query->query("www.verrotech.com", DNSTypes::NAME_A);
echo "RC = ".$a->getRcode()." '".$a->getRcodeDescription()."'\n";

$a = $query->query("www.google.com", DNSTypes::NAME_A);
echo "RC = ".$a->getRcode()." '".$a->getRcodeDescription()."'\n";

Produces:

RC = 0 'No error condition'
RC = 5 'Refused'

@Legendary4226 please feel free to test this on the current master, once confirmed this meets your requirements I'll put it into a release.

Thanks again for your suggestion.

Documentation: added RCODE into to usage document.

I can easily access the RCODE as an int, that's perfect

Thank's you very much :)

Released in 2.3.1

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Cannot access the RCODE returned by the DNS server #27

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Cannot access the RCODE returned by the DNS server #27

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purplepixie commented on Sep 29, 2025

purplepixie commented on Sep 29, 2025

purplepixie commented on Sep 29, 2025

Legendary4226 commented on Sep 29, 2025

purplepixie commented on Sep 30, 2025

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