Re: small vent

[Patrick Greenwell <patrick () namesecure com>]

On Sat, 27 Jun 1998, Michael Dillon wrote:

> On Sat, 27 Jun 1998, Patrick Greenwell wrote:
>
> > > Why can't the ISPs get their act together and use a whois client that
> > > allows a simple request like "whois name" to find the appropriate
> > > database? 
> >
> > Possibly because that would be a backwards way to approach to the
> > issue. What you propose would require that every person running a machine
> > that has a version of whois install this new version of whois, rather than
> > handling it intelligently at the registry level which would require no
> > action on the part of the hundreds of thousands of machines out there. 
>
> I believe in distributed intelligence rather than making everyone rely on
> a single central point of failure. 

First off, the whois database *is* a single point of failure for all
intents and purposes. There is no "distributed intelligence" contained
within. Rwhois fits the distributed intelligence model much more closely. 

> If the default registry compiled into your whois client fails then you
> can no longer reach any registry database at all whereas an intelligent
> client would still be able to reach most databases. 

And again, this can be handled intelligently at the registry level. It's
not like none of us have ever seen a proxy server. :-) 

Also, all these splits have come "after the fact." How many more will
occur? Should we all run out and grab a new whois client every time a
change occurs? And really, why should this be necessary?

> There is also the problem that the default registry in most whois
> clients is the Internic run by NSI and the management of that
> company has shown themselves time and time again to be utterly clueless
> about these kinds of issues. 

Well, there is one thing I won't argue about. I could however tell you
about my experience with ARIN a little over a month ago and how it took
being transferred 5 times before I got to someone that knew what I was
talking about when I said "arin.net is not resolving" but I'll spare you.

> I don't hold out much hope that pleading on hands and knees with the
> royal Internic will lead to them implementing a whois proxy service.

I don't think that it will be up to NSI in a few months. 

The point I believe the original poster was making, and one that I agree
with is that it is quite possible to make all these internal issues and
changes transparent to the end user by some simple coordination by the
various number registries. 

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Patrick Greenwell                                        (800) 299-1288 v
                           Systems Administrator         (925) 377-1414 f
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