Using Podman Quadlets for Dynamic DNS with desec.io

Dynamic DNS (DDNS) automatically updates DNS records when your IP address changes. This following post shows how to set up DDNS using ddns-updater, desec.io, and Podman Quadlets.

The podman container can run under the root user or rootless.

Setup

1. Create Kubernetes Pod YAML

Create a yaml file to store the following manifest:

---
apiVersion: v1
kind: Pod
metadata:
  labels:
    app: ddns-updater
    io.containers.autoupdate: registry
  name: ddns-updater
spec:
  containers:
    - image: docker.io/qmcgaw/ddns-updater:latest
      name: v4
      env:
      - name: LOG_LEVEL
        value: INFO
      - name: SERVER_ENABLED
        value: "false"
      - name: PERIOD
        value: 5m
      - name: CONFIG
        value: >
          {
            "settings": [
              {
                "provider": "desec",
                "domain": "ddns.example.com",
                "token": "your_desec_token_here",
                "ip_version": "ipv4"
              }
            ]
          }

    - image: docker.io/qmcgaw/ddns-updater:latest
      name: v6
      env:
      - name: LOG_LEVEL
        value: INFO
      - name: SERVER_ENABLED
        value: "false"
      - name: HEALTH_SERVER_ADDRESS
        value: "127.0.0.1:9998"
      - name: PERIOD
        value: 5m
      - name: CONFIG
        value: >
          {
            "settings": [
              {
                "provider": "desec",
                "domain": "ddns.example.com",
                "ipv6_suffix": ""
                "token": "your_desec_token_here",
                "ip_version": "ipv6"
              }
            ]
          }

2. Create Podman Quadlet

Create /etc/containers/systemd/ddns-updater.kube (rootfull) or ~/.config/containers/systemd/ddns-updater.kube (rootless):

[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

[Unit]
Description=Dynamic DNS Updater for desec.io
After=network-online.target
Wants=network-online.target

[Kube]
Yaml=<full path to pod yaml>
Network=host

[Service]
Restart=always
RestartSec=10
TimeoutStartSec=900

3. Enable and Start

# rootfull
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now ddns-updater

# rootless
systemctl --user daemon-reload
systemctl --user enable --now ddns-updater

Monitoring

Check status:

# rootfull
systemctl status ddns-updater

# rootless
systemctl --user status ddns-updater

View logs:

podman logs ddns-updater-v4
podman logs ddns-updater-v6

# rootfull
journalctl -u ddns-updater

# rootless
journalctl --user -u ddns-updater

Test DNS resolution:

dig +short A ddns.example.com
dig +short AAAA ddns.example.com