Hello,
For a while now, the timestamp in the SOA record of DNS zones managed by OVH no longer follows the de facto standard YYYYMMDDxx.
For a zone that was just modified, the timestamp is: 2076254247 … How should this be interpreted?
My guess is: date(now) + 300000000 … a way to avoid going back compared to 2026MMddxx?
Do you confirm?
Hello @fritz2cat
Indeed, the SOA is no longer based on a year/month/day date format; it is now based on a UNIX timestamp, i.e., a number representing time in seconds. This change allows far more updates within a single day and avoids synchronization issues between servers.
To ensure the transition proceeds correctly, we take the current timestamp and add a fixed offset. This offset guarantees that the new serial number always stays higher than the old date‑based format, preventing any risk of regression.
For example, if the current timestamp is 1772804945, adding an offset of 300 000 000 results in a new SOA of 2072804945. This number is well above an old format such as 2026031100, allowing systems to keep running without error 
Astérix
What about the 2038 bug 
I thought of that right away. It will be enough to calculate in 64-bit, instead of 31.
Exactly
We have until 2038, which gives us a bit of leeway 