Yes, BIND's named service does log startup errors by default. The daemon writes to syslog using the daemon facility when running on Unix-like systems. The exact log location depends on your syslog configuration, but common paths include:

/var/log/messages      # RHEL/CentOS traditional
/var/log/syslog        # Debian/Ubuntu
/var/log/daemon.log    # Some distributions

BIND includes built-in tools for configuration validation:

# Syntax check for named.conf
named-checkconf /etc/named.conf

# Zone file validation
named-checkzone example.com /var/named/example.com.zone

The named-checkconf tool specifically addresses the Wikipedia mention of configuration verification. It returns exit code 0 on success or outputs error messages with line numbers when issues are found.

Here's how to troubleshoot a failing BIND startup:

# Check config syntax first
sudo named-checkconf /etc/named.conf

# If clean, attempt to start with debug logging
sudo named -g -d 3

# Check system logs in another terminal
tail -f /var/log/syslog | grep named

Common startup errors include:

• Permission issues on zone files or config directories
• Syntax errors in configuration (missing semicolons, brackets)
• Port 53 being occupied by another process

To modify logging locations in BIND 9, add to your named.conf:

logging {
    channel custom_log {
        file "/var/log/named/errors.log" versions 5 size 20m;
        severity debug 3;
        print-time yes;
        print-severity yes;
    };
    category default { custom_log; };
};

Remember to create the log directory and set appropriate permissions:

sudo mkdir /var/log/named
sudo chown named:named /var/log/named

Yes, BIND's named service does log startup errors by default. The primary log location depends on your operating system and configuration:

# Common default paths:
/var/log/named.log          # RHEL/CentOS
/var/log/bind/named.log     # Debian/Ubuntu
/var/log/messages           # Systemd systems may log here

You can specify custom logging locations in named.conf:

logging {
    channel default_debug {
        file "/var/log/named/debug.log" versions 3 size 5m;
        severity dynamic;
        print-time yes;
    };
};

BIND includes named-checkconf for validating configuration files:

# Basic syntax check:
named-checkconf /etc/named.conf

# Check zone files:
named-checkzone example.com /var/named/example.com.zone

When encountering startup failures, check both the BIND logs and system logs:

# Check BIND-specific logs:
tail -f /var/log/named.log

# Check system logs for context:
journalctl -u named --no-pager -n 50

Here are frequent issues and their fixes:

# Permission problems:
chown named:named /var/named -R
chmod 640 /etc/named.conf

# Syntax errors (use the verification tool):
named-checkconf /etc/named.conf