I have done something similar myself. First I tried to put the TXT record at the same domain which I did want to redirect. To tackle the CNAME problem did I come up with a complicated solution which I also did write up (https://github.com/tellnes/dhr2). But when I actually tried to use it was it too complicated.
What I'm actually using now and have been using for some time is just a simple TXT record at a subdomain (eg _redirect.example.com). I also have a script which looks for these TXT records in my zones and adds A/AAAA records when needed.
You can check it out as follows:
dig TXT +noall +answer _redirect.infogym.no
dig A +noall +answer infogym.no
dig AAAA +noall +answer infogym.no
curl -Is infogym.no | grep Location
Hmmm, I'm not seeing the value proposition here. Or, I'm unclear why I'd use this service.
Here's how I understand redirect.name working:
===
1. An A/ALIAS/ANAME record for "example.com" points to a redirect.name service (self-hosted or otherwise).
2. The service sees the "example.com" HTTP request via the host header.
3. Service does a DNS lookup for a matching TXT record redirect rule.
4. When found, the service issues a 301/302 HTTP redirect, according to the matching rule.
===
Is this correct?
If so, compare to:
===
1. Create an A record for "example.com" that points to my Apache server.
2. Apache detects "example.com" via the host header.
3. Virtual host config for matching domain issues a 301/302 HTTP redirect.
===
Aside from shuffling the redirect config from Apache to DNS, what's the advantage of using redirect.name?
Additionally, every domain name registrar I've used includes a feature called "URL forwarding" that can redirect all HTTP requests for a domain to another. Again, what benefit does redirect.name provide that URL forwarding doesn't?
I'd love to hear the use cases.
What is an ALIAS or ANAME record? I've never heard of that, and it isn't listed among these record types: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_DNS_record_types
This is nice. I can finally get some easy redirects here, as Cloudflare's page rules don't work.
Clever! Thanks for making this open source. I really like small services like this written with Lua+nginx.
So I have to trust my domain with a 3rd party and pray they never shut down? No thanks!
Shame it requires polluting the root of your zone. Could have used a TXT record at "_redirect-name.example.com" or similar instead.
[edit] Also, this service will be abused by spammers and it will then become impossible to use a "redirect.name" URL in email.