DNS Overview
Why do we need a Domain Name System (DNS)? The development of your business website that the Lunchbox team works on depends on a lot of factors, but one of the critical processes involves the identification and configuration of its actual domain name (e.g., www.<business name>.com). Essentially, this overview provides insight into the requirements needed to find and configure your website’s domain (i.e., your company’s website) so that your guests can locate your business on the Internet.
Think of the domain names (e.g., www.lunchbox.io) being like the contact names/pictures in your smartphone while the IP addresses (e.g., 192.0.2.0) are like their actual, listed phone numbers.
All websites or domain names have an IP address, which displays their accurate location for the internet. It is critical that the configuration of this information is correct otherwise, you risk contacting and visiting the wrong site!
Feature Contents:
Overview
This article contains details on how to configure your DNS for different providers.
Finding your Domain Host
A Domain Host is an Internet service (i.e., GoDaddy, Cloudflare, etc.) that houses and manages your domain name (e.g., lunchbox.io). All domain hosts use Domain Name System (DNS) records to connect your domain name with email, websites, and other web services.
NOTE: If you already know where your DNS is hosted, omit this section and continue to the Configuring DNS for Different Providers section.
Using NS Lookup Tool
What is a Name Server? The Name Server (NS) organizes and routes traffic across the internet.
The Name Server translates the Domain Name (i.e., like the contact photo in a smartphone) into an IP address (i.e., like the contact’s phone number), acting as a bridge between human understanding and computer identification.
NOTE: This section can be omitted if you already know where your DNS is hosted (e.g., GoDaddy, Cloudflare, etc.).
Step 1: Go to the NS Lookup Tool, which is a part of the DNS Checker website.
Step 2: Enter your Domain Name (e.g., bareburger.com) into the search field and select the Show NS Records button.
Step 3: After the search field returns results, scroll down to find the Name Server listed beside the Owner field.
Configuring DNS for different Providers
GoDaddy
Step 1: Sign in to your GoDaddy account.
Step 2: Select the correct domain from the main My Products page.
Step 3: Click on the Manage Domain link from the Quick Links section, located on the right side of the page.
Step 4: In Domain Settings, scroll down to Additional Settings and select Manage DNS.
Step 5: The DNS Management page opens. Within the DNS Records section, select the Add button.
Step 6: The Add Record section opens. Information for the following can be added for the record:
Type - The type of DNS Record (e.g., "A" stands for "address" and indicates an IP address of a given domain).
Name - The Host Name for the record (e.g., "@" or "www" are possible values).
Value - The IP Address for the record.
TTL - (Time To Live) This is the amount of time (in seconds) that the record is allowed to be cached.
Cloudflare
Step 1: Sign in to the account, which can be done from the top-right portion of the page.
Step 2: Select the domain name to manage.
Step 3: Select the DNS icon.
Step 4: Select the Add Record button.
Step 5: Select / Input the values in the following dropdowns / fields:
Type: CNAME
Name: order (i.e., the name of the subdomain)
Target: Lunchbox should provide you with this value.
TTL: Auto
Proxy Status: Select DNS only
Do not forget to select the Save button when finished entering the information.
Sucuri
Step 1: Sign into your Sucuri account.
Step 2: Go to my.sucuri.net, or click on the logo that is located in the top-left.
Step 3: Select the gear icon on the card with the domain to manage and select Firewall Settings.
Step 4: Select the DNS option on the following page.
Step 5: Select the Add Record button, and a popup will appear.
Step 6: Enter the following values:
DNS Record Type: CNAME
Sub-Domain: order (the name of the subdomain)
TTL (Time To Live): 5 minutes
Points To: Lunchbox should provide you with this value
When you have entered all information, select the Add DNS Record button.
Amazon Web Services Route 53
Step 1: Sign in to the AWS console.
Step 2: Search for Route53 in the home console (see screenshot below) or use the navigation on the top of the page.
Step 3: Select the Hosted zones link, located on the route53 home page.
Step 4: Select the domain name to manage (i.e., click the blue link of the domain name).
Step 5: Select the Create Record Set button.
Step 6: Enter the values provided in the fields:
Name: order (the name of the subdomain)
Type: CNAME - Canonical name
Alias: No
TTL (Seconds): 300
Value: Lunchbox should provide you with the value
Routing Policy: Simple
Step 7: Select Create at the bottom of this page to save the changes.
Squarespace
Step 1: Log into your Squarespace admin dashboard.
Step 2: Select the Domain tab near the top of the page. Click on the row to select the domain to be managed.
Step 3: Select the Advanced Settings option.
Step 4: On the bottom of the page, there are values that will need to be set.
Step 5: When adding a new row of values, the following columns require information to be input into them:
Host: This value will be set to the “name” value that the Lunchbox Team provides you with.
Record: Use the dropdown to select the CNAME value.
Priority: Leave this field as N/A.
Data: This field will be set to the “value” that the Lunchbox Team provides you with.
When finished, select the Add button.
Important Squarespace Notes:
Squarespace does not support a leading underscore (_) in their DNS values.
Lunchbox's SSL DNS value has a leading underscore. This underscore can be removed before saving your changes.
What lunchbox provides: _<random value>.acm-validations.aws
What squarespace will accept: <random value>.acm-validations.aws
The following process involves how to configure a Lunchbox website on a Domain Name with a Nameserver that is on Google Domains.
NOTE: You can use NS lookup (described here) to find your nameserver. Also, Google domain nameservers contain "googledomains.com" within them.
Example (see image above) of an NS lookup for a domain whose DNS is Google Domains.
Step 1: Navigate to Google Domains using the following URL: https://domains.google/
Step 2: Log into the corresponding Google account that owns the domain you wish to manage. If you're already logged in, select the My domains link that is located in the top-right portion of the page.
Step 3: Navigate to My Domains, located on the left-side menu pane.
Step 4: From the list of domains on the page, select the Manage link on the entry that you want to manage the DNS for.
Step 5: Select the DNS link on the left-side menu.
Step 6: Select the Manage custom records link; doing so will make the rows of entries become editable.
Step 7: Scroll down the list and select Create new record. A new record will be created at the bottom of the list with editable fields for the Host Name, Type, TTL, and Data.
Step 8: Depending on the services you have with Lunchbox, you’ll either have two (2) or three (3) new DNS entries to add/edit on your DNS.
Step 8a: SSL verification: The Name and Value fields are randomly generated. This entry allows the Lunchbox Team to host your website on secure connect, HTTPS required by all major browsers (see here for more information).
Step 8b: The Subdomain for your online ordering website. Ex: http://order.eatlunchbox.com
Step 8c: The Subdomain for your online catering website. Ex: http://catering.eatlunchbox.com
NOTE: The screenshot below contains example values; each domain has its own values. The Lunchbox Team will provide your domain’s specific values.
NOTE: DNS update propagation can take 24 - 48 hours, but is usually propagated within 5 - 10 minutes.
Wix
The following process involves how to configure a brand’s domain name for their Lunchbox online ordering and/or catering ordering website if your DNS provider is Wix.com .
To determine your DNS provider please follow the instructions here
Prerequisites
Lunchbox provided DNS values. It will be either 2 or 3 pairs of DNS names/values (if you have catering it will be 3 pairs). All of which will be the CNAME DNS record type.
No other website is already occupying the order/catering.brandname.com subdomain.
For example, if order.cleanjuice.com resolves to a website. No two websites can occupy the same subdomain. In this example
order
is the subdomain and cleanjuice.com is the brand’s domain name.Talk to your CSM/delivery specialist for options
Steps:
Step 1: Go to Log In | Wix and log in to the account that is managing the domain name account.
Step 2: Upon logging in, you will be directed to a landing page showing the list of available websites under that account. Select the website that is connected to the domain name you’d like to set up.
Step 3: Go to settings on the side navigation
Step 4: Select manage domains
Step 5: Under the domain name, you want to configure, click the three dots and select manage dns
Step 6: Scroll to the section titled CNAME
and on the bottom of that section click add record
Step 7: Fill in the name with the name of the record, the type as CNAME, and value as the value provided
For example one of the DNS pairs
1name: order 2value: akbsdasd.cloudfront.net 3type: CNAME
Step 8: Repeat steps 6-7 for all the pairs of name values provided by Lunchbox.
Step 9: DNS providers need to propagate these new entries around the internet so that others can find the website. It may take up to 24 for changes to be seen. However, in most cases, it takes effect within 2-5 minutes
Step 10: After this is complete, notify Lunchbox to confirm everything is configured properly and we’ll handle the rest from here