DNSHop

Modern Windows and Linux DNS benchmarking utility built with C# 12, .NET 8, Avalonia, SukiUI, and MVVM.

Phase 1 - Setup and MVVM scaffold

# From repository root
New-Item -ItemType Directory -Path DNSHop -Force
cd DNSHop

dotnet new sln -n DNSHop

dotnet new avalonia.mvvm -n DNSHop.App -o src/DNSHop.App

dotnet sln DNSHop.sln add src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj

dotnet add src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj package SukiUI
dotnet add src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj package DnsClient
dotnet add src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj package CsvHelper
dotnet add src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj package Avalonia.Controls.DataGrid

Scaffolded MVVM core:

• src/DNSHop.App/ViewModels/MainWindowViewModel.cs
• src/DNSHop.App/ViewModels/DnsServerResultViewModel.cs
• src/DNSHop.App/Models/*.cs
• src/DNSHop.App/Views/MainWindow.axaml

Phase 2 - DNS benchmarking engine

Core benchmarking service:

• src/DNSHop.App/Services/DnsBenchmarkService.cs

Features implemented:

• Concurrent benchmarking with Task.WhenAll + SemaphoreSlim concurrency cap.
• Cached probe: google.com.
• Uncached probe: randomized Guid.com.
• DotCom probe: com NS.
• Reliability probes:
  • Redirecting/NXDOMAIN hijack check: randomized .invalid query.
  • DNSSEC validation check: dnssec-failed.org (SERVFAIL expected for validating resolvers).
• Protocol support:
  • Standard UDP/TCP DNS via DnsClient.NET.
  • DoH via RFC 8484 wire-format POST.
  • DoT via TLS-wrapped DNS with length-prefixed wire format.

Phase 3 - Avalonia + SukiUI UI/UX

Main shell:

• src/DNSHop.App/Views/MainWindow.axaml using SukiWindow.
• src/DNSHop.App/App.axaml with SukiTheme for light/dark theme switching.

Views included:

• Introduction
• Nameservers (main DataGrid + context menu)
• Tabular Data
• Conclusions

UI features:

• Dashboard with queries remaining, completion %, elapsed time.
• Filterable/sortable nameserver list.
• Context-menu actions:
  • Remove / Sideline / Pin to Top
  • Remove Dead / Non-DNSSEC / Redirecting
  • Copy IP
  • Sort by Best / Cached / Uncached
• Custom response-time visual bars:
  • src/DNSHop.App/Controls/ResponseBarsControl.cs

Phase 4 - Export and desktop packaging

Export services:

• src/DNSHop.App/Services/ExportService.cs

Supported exports:

• CSV
• JSON
• PNG chart snapshot copied to clipboard

Packaging assets:

• installer/DNSHop.iss
• publish-win-x64.ps1
• publish-linux-x64.sh
• publish-linux-appimage.sh

Release assets typically include:

• DNS-Hop-Setup-vX.Y.exe Windows installer
• DNS-Hop-Portable-vX.Y.zip Windows portable build
• DNS-Hop-AppImage-vX.Y-x86_64.AppImage Linux AppImage

Publish commands

dotnet publish src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj `
  -c Release `
  -r win-x64 `
  --self-contained true `
  /p:PublishSingleFile=true `
  /p:PublishTrimmed=true `
  /p:TrimMode=partial `
  /p:IncludeNativeLibrariesForSelfExtract=true `
  -o artifacts/publish-win-x64-release

dotnet publish src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj \
  -c Release \
  -r linux-x64 \
  --self-contained true \
  /p:PublishSingleFile=true \
  /p:IncludeNativeLibrariesForSelfExtract=true \
  -o artifacts/publish-linux-x64

Build + run locally

dotnet restore
dotnet build DNSHop.sln
dotnet run --project src/DNSHop.App/DNSHop.App.csproj

Linux / WSL notes

• DNS Hop targets Windows and Linux desktop releases.
• System DNS switching on Linux supports classic UDP/TCP DNS endpoints with direct IP addresses.
• On standard Linux, DNS Hop first tries NetworkManager or systemd-resolved; if neither is available it falls back to writing /etc/resolv.conf.
• On WSL, DNS Hop writes /etc/resolv.conf. For changes to survive a WSL restart, /etc/wsl.conf needs [network] generateResolvConf=false.
• WSL testing requires WSLg for the GUI. The published artifacts/publish-linux-x64/DNSHop.App binary is self-contained and does not require the .NET runtime inside WSL.
• publish-linux-appimage.sh produces artifacts/DNSHop-linux-x86_64.AppImage.
• GitHub Actions now builds the AppImage on ubuntu-22.04 and smoke-tests the bundled binary on Debian 12, Fedora 41, and Arch using DNSHop.App --smoke-test.

Notes

• On startup, the app can merge built-in resolvers with a public list feed.
• Export files are written to: Documents\DNSHop\Exports.