is the name or IP address of the name server to query. This can be an IPv4 address in dotted-decimal notation or an IPv6 address in colon-delimited notation. When the supplied server argument is a hostname, delv resolves that name before querying that name server (note, however, that this initial lookup is not validated by DNSSEC).

If no server argument is provided, delv consults /etc/resolv.conf; if an address is found there, it queries the name server at that address. If either of the -4 or -6 options are in use, then only addresses for the corresponding transport will be tried. If no usable addresses are found, delv will send queries to the localhost addresses (127.0.0.1 for IPv4, ::1 for IPv6).

is the domain name to be looked up.

indicates what type of query is required — ANY, A, MX, etc. type can be any valid query type. If no type argument is supplied, delv will perform a lookup for an A record.

Specifies a file from which to read DNSSEC trust anchors. The default is /etc/bind.keys, which is included with BIND 9 and contains trust anchors for the root zone (".") and for the ISC DNSSEC lookaside validation zone ("dlv.isc.org").

Keys that do not match the root or DLV trust-anchor names are ignored; these key names can be overridden using the +dlv=NAME or +root=NAME options.

Note: When reading the trust anchor file, delv treats managed-keys statements and trusted-keys statements identically. That is, for a managed key, it is the initial key that is trusted; RFC 5011 key management is not supported. delv will not consult the managed-keys database maintained by named. This means that if either of the keys in /etc/bind.keys is revoked and rolled over, it will be necessary to update /etc/bind.keys to use DNSSEC validation in delv.

Sets the source IP address of the query to address. This must be a valid address on one of the host's network interfaces or "0.0.0.0" or "::". An optional source port may be specified by appending "#<port>"

Sets the query class for the requested data. Currently, only class "IN" is supported in delv and any other value is ignored.

Set the systemwide debug level to level. The allowed range is from 0 to 99. The default is 0 (no debugging). Debugging traces from delv become more verbose as the debug level increases. See the +mtrace, +rtrace, and +vtrace options below for additional debugging details.

Display the delv help usage output and exit.

Insecure mode. This disables internal DNSSEC validation. (Note, however, this does not set the CD bit on upstream queries. If the server being queried is performing DNSSEC validation, then it will not return invalid data; this can cause delv to time out. When it is necessary to examine invalid data to debug a DNSSEC problem, use dig +cd.)

Enables memory usage debugging.

Specifies a destination port to use for queries instead of the standard DNS port number 53. This option would be used with a name server that has been configured to listen for queries on a non-standard port number.

Sets the query name to name. While the query name can be specified without using the -q, it is sometimes necessary to disambiguate names from types or classes (for example, when looking up the name "ns", which could be misinterpreted as the type NS, or "ch", which could be misinterpreted as class CH).

Sets the query type to type, which can be any valid query type supported in BIND 9 except for zone transfer types AXFR and IXFR. As with -q, this is useful to distinguish query name type or class when they are ambiguous. it is sometimes necessary to disambiguate names from types.

The default query type is "A", unless the -x option is supplied to indicate a reverse lookup, in which case it is "PTR".

Print the delv version and exit.

Performs a reverse lookup, mapping an addresses to a name. addr is an IPv4 address in dotted-decimal notation, or a colon-delimited IPv6 address. When -x is used, there is no need to provide the name or type arguments. delv automatically performs a lookup for a name like 11.12.13.10.in-addr.arpa and sets the query type to PTR. IPv6 addresses are looked up using nibble format under the IP6.ARPA domain.

Forces delv to only use IPv4.

Forces delv to only use IPv6.

Controls whether to set the CD (checking disabled) bit in queries sent by delv. This may be useful when troubleshooting DNSSEC problems from behind a validating resolver. A validating resolver will block invalid responses, making it difficult to retrieve them for analysis. Setting the CD flag on queries will cause the resolver to return invalid responses, which delv can then validate internally and report the errors in detail.

Controls whether to display the CLASS when printing a record. The default is to display the CLASS.

Controls whether to display the TTL when printing a record. The default is to display the TTL.

Toggle resolver fetch logging. This reports the name and type of each query sent by delv in the process of carrying out the resolution and validation process: this includes including the original query and all subsequent queries to follow CNAMEs and to establish a chain of trust for DNSSEC validation.

This is equivalent to setting the debug level to 1 in the "resolver" logging category. Setting the systemwide debug level to 1 using the -d option will product the same output (but will affect other logging categories as well).

Toggle message logging. This produces a detailed dump of the responses received by delv in the process of carrying out the resolution and validation process.

This is equivalent to setting the debug level to 10 for the the "packets" module of the "resolver" logging category. Setting the systemwide debug level to 10 using the -d option will produce the same output (but will affect other logging categories as well).

Toggle validation logging. This shows the internal process of the validator as it determines whether an answer is validly signed, unsigned, or invalid.

This is equivalent to setting the debug level to 3 for the the "validator" module of the "dnssec" logging category. Setting the systemwide debug level to 3 using the -d option will produce the same output (but will affect other logging categories as well).

Provide a terse answer. The default is to print the answer in a verbose form.

Toggle the display of comment lines in the output. The default is to print comments.

Toggle the display of per-record comments in the output (for example, human-readable key information about DNSKEY records). The default is to print per-record comments.

Toggle the display of cryptographic fields in DNSSEC records. The contents of these field are unnecessary to debug most DNSSEC validation failures and removing them makes it easier to see the common failures. The default is to display the fields. When omitted they are replaced by the string "[omitted]" or in the DNSKEY case the key id is displayed as the replacement, e.g. "[ key id = value ]".

Controls whether to display the trust level when printing a record. The default is to display the trust level.

Split long hex- or base64-formatted fields in resource records into chunks of W characters (where W is rounded up to the nearest multiple of 4). +nosplit or +split=0 causes fields not to be split at all. The default is 56 characters, or 44 characters when multiline mode is active.

Set or clear the display options +[no]comments, +[no]rrcomments, and +[no]trust as a group.

Print long records (such as RRSIG, DNSKEY, and SOA records) in a verbose multi-line format with human-readable comments. The default is to print each record on a single line, to facilitate machine parsing of the delv output.

Indicates whether to display RRSIG records in the delv output. The default is to do so. Note that (unlike in dig) this does not control whether to request DNSSEC records or whether to validate them. DNSSEC records are always requested, and validation will always occur unless suppressed by the use of -i or +noroot and +nodlv.

Indicates whether to perform conventional (non-lookaside) DNSSEC validation, and if so, specifies the name of a trust anchor. The default is to validate using a trust anchor of "." (the root zone), for which there is a built-in key. If specifying a different trust anchor, then -a must be used to specify a file containing the key.

Indicates whether to perform DNSSEC lookaside validation, and if so, specifies the name of the DLV trust anchor. The default is to perform lookaside validation using a trust anchor of "dlv.isc.org", for which there is a built-in key. If specifying a different name, then -a must be used to specify a file containing the DLV key.