I'm creating new DNS records in our DC (Windows Server 2016) and I bump into zones where there are a lot of records that do not have a regular hostname, only an "@".
We are using scopes and policies, new Windows Server 2016 features for DNS configuration.
I know that one can use "*" for wildcards in hostnames, but I don't know the meaning of "@".
Best Answer
If the name for a domain (or zone) is "example.com.", then an @ record indicates that the name for the DNS record is also "example.com."
In the GUI for a Microsoft Windows Server DNS Service, this is (or at least has been for a long time) called "Same as parent folder".
Normally the name used for a DNS record indicates everything before the name of the zone (commonly called the "domain name"). So if you enter a record named "server01" in a DNS zone called "example.com.", then the full record is "server01.example.com." If you want to enter a record where the full record is just "example.com" (which is necessary for a lot of things, like MX records), then you enter an @ in many DNS systems to tell the DNS server to respond to requests for "example.com." with the data you add to the record in question.