dns problems after migration

What's the zone and record you're trying to update?

By default, everyone else's nameserver will cache responses for about 24 hours, so unless you plan ahead and tweak the TTL, there will be some amount of stale data in people's caches. There are various command-line ways to see what Linode's nameservers are giving out, but OpenDNS's cache check is quick and easy:

http://www.opendns.com/support/cache/

It's always recommended to lower the TTL value of the A record at least 1-2 days before the change occurs. Silly question but when you modified the A record, did you put the zone into EDIT mode and then back to ACTIVE? I think edit mode is needed to generate a new serial, so the rest of the name servers can properly handle changed zone information.

@melon:

… Silly question but when you modified the A record, did you put the zone into EDIT mode and then back to ACTIVE? I think edit mode is needed to generate a new serial, so the rest of the name servers can properly handle changed zone information.

I've always left my zones in active mode, and Linode's nameservers update the serial number when I make changes.

@mnordhoff:

I've always left my zones in active mode, and Linode's nameservers update the serial number when I make changes.
Thanks for the info, I wasn't aware of that. It seems then that edit mode is to prevent updating while your zone is not ready.