F5 DNS (Formerly GTM)

F5 DNS (Formerly GTM)

Course Summary

F5 DNS (formerly Global Traffic Manager – GTM) is a specialized training program tailored for network engineers, system administrators, and IT professionals seeking expertise in managing intelligent, high-performance DNS traffic steering and load balancing using the F5 BIG-IP DNS module.

This course provides a solid foundation in the deployment, configuration, and operation of F5 DNS services. You’ll learn how to optimize and secure DNS infrastructure across multiple data centers and cloud environments, improving application availability, speed, and reliability for users around the world.

With DNS at the heart of any distributed network architecture, mastering F5 DNS is essential for ensuring seamless application delivery, disaster recovery, and global server load balancing.

Why Choose F5 DNS?

In the modern world of hybrid-cloud applications, content delivery networks (CDNs), and globally distributed data centers, DNS plays a critical role in delivering fast, secure, and reliable user experiences.

F5 DNS (GTM) is more than just a DNS server—it enables:

  • Global load balancing across regions and data centers

  • High availability of applications using intelligent traffic steering

  • Seamless failover and disaster recovery

  • Faster DNS resolution with caching and IP Anycast

  • Enhanced visibility and control over DNS traffic

F5 DNS integrates with other BIG-IP modules to offer a powerful application delivery ecosystem that adapts to user location, server health, and custom-defined policies.

Who Should Enroll

This course is designed for:

  • Network and Systems Engineers managing enterprise DNS infrastructures

  • DevOps and Site Reliability Engineers (SREs) handling globally distributed applications

  • Cloud Architects and IT Managers looking to implement geo-redundant systems

  • IT Professionals and Administrators preparing for F5 certification

  • Organizations using or planning to use BIG-IP DNS (GTM) solutions

Key Benefits of the Course

  • Practical Training: Real-world use cases in DNS load balancing and high-availability setups

  • Cloud-Ready: Techniques applicable across hybrid and multi-cloud environments

  • Performance-Focused: Improve DNS resolution speeds and reduce latency for end-users

  • Security Enhancements: DNS firewall, DDoS protection, and visibility into DNS queries

  • Certification Alignment: Ideal foundation for F5 Certified Technology Specialist (CTS) – DNS certification

Why F5 DNS Is Critical in Modern IT

DNS is often a bottleneck or a blind spot in enterprise networks. With users accessing apps from various locations and devices, it’s vital to ensure DNS requests are handled efficiently, securely, and with full awareness of infrastructure health.

F5 DNS helps businesses:

  • Reduce downtime with intelligent traffic redirection

  • Maintain SLA commitments during regional outages

  • Enable faster time-to-resolution with global name resolution

  • Integrate with GSLB, health checks, and iRules for policy-driven traffic control

  • Provide visibility into DNS performance and query analytics

Conclusion

The F5 DNS (formerly GTM) course offers the essential training you need to build a robust, high-performance DNS architecture for enterprise-grade applications. Whether you’re running multiple data centers, hybrid cloud workloads, or global web apps, this course prepares you to manage DNS with precision, intelligence, and speed.

Upgrade your skillset, reduce application downtime, and improve user experience worldwide with F5 DNS expertise.

F5 DNS (Formerly GTM) Syllabus

Modules

Provision the BIG-IP system for operation

Back up the BIG-IP system configuration for safekeeping

Describe how the Domain Name System (DNS) resolves host names into IP addresses

Describe how the BIG-IP DNS system can participate in the DNS resolution process

Use DNS Express on the BIG-IP DNS system to accelerate DNS resolution

Cache DNS query responses on BIG-IP DNS to accelerate DNS resolution

Load balance DNS queries to a pool of DNS servers and monitor pool health

Configure the key features of the BIG-IP DNS system to perform intelligent DNS resolution

Describe the LDNS probes used by BIG-IP DNS to support path-based load balancing

Configure a wide IP pool to use a path load balancing method

View and confirm DNS resolution behavior using path load balancing methods

Use static and dynamic load balancing methods to intelligently resolve DNS queries

Use persistence to effectively return one or more clients to the same virtual server on each query

Use manual resume to control certain load balancing behavior in the event of an outage

Configure and use load balancing decision logs to fine-tune and troubleshoot DNS resolution

Configure monitors on the BIG-IP DNS system in support of DNS resolution

Configure BIG-IP DNS to participate in the DNSSEC chain of trust

Configure limit settings on virtual servers, servers, and wide IP pools to temporarily direct client traffic away from resources that may not be performing at certain thresholds of efficiency

Configure iRules on a wide IP to customize intelligent DNS resolution

Describe the other wide IP types provided with BIG-IP DNS

Configure a BIG-IP DNS sync group

Apply all the principles learned throughout the course to configure a BIG-IP DNS system based on hypothetical specifications

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