Registering Local Macs Dynamically in DNS

Question

I would like my Mac clients to register their hostnames dynamically into DNS.  Our Mac server provides DHCP currently and will provide DNS once I get DDNS working.  Apple's manuals all deal with making static entries into DNS so they are of no help.
I have found only one article so far that explained how to enable DDNS: http://labs.hoffmanlabs.com/node/1745.  Here's a portion of the instructions:
Shut down DNS, launch Terminal.app, issue a command to create a backup copy of the file and then an ASCII text editor (with the editor commands visible on the bottom of the nano display):
sudo cp /etc/dns/publicView.conf.apple /etc/dns/publicView.conf.apple-savesudo nano /etc/dns/publicView.conf.apple
and navigate to the entries for both the forward zone and for the reverse zone
     zone "example.net." {          type master;          file "db.example.net.";          allow-transfer {any;};          allow-update {none;};     };
and add/change the allow-update allow-update line found within the zone from none to localnets:
allow-update { localnets; };
I made the change above successfully.  However, I opened Server Admin afterwards and used it to modify a different DNS option.  Doing this caused Server Admin to overwrite the publicView.conf.apple file, undoing my modifications to "allow-update".
Am I going to be forced to make the change through CLI and not use Server Admin at all for DNS configuration if I don't want my changes being overwritten?
Also, will I need to configure the Mac clients to register their hostname or will I need to configure the DHCP service to do this?

Answer 1

DriveThru wrote:
Am I going to be forced to make the change through CLI and not use Server Admin at all for DNS configuration if I don't want my changes being overwritten?
Yes. Unfortunately, with DNS, it's either manage through the GUI or the CLI. You have to pick one and stick with it.