Re: whois syntax

[Valdis.Kletnieks () vt edu]

On Sat, 20 Oct 2001 16:15:48 PDT, Vadim Antonov said:
> A well-defined and widely implemented query language to large volumes of
> data organized into tables does, in fact, exist.
>
> It is called SQL.
>
> I guess all that whois silliness is an acute case of NIH syndrome.

1)  I think it was more a case of NIY (Not Invented Yet).

2) If you think arguing about syntax is silly, wait till it
sinks in that if the syntax is standardized, the NEXT fight is
about what to call the fields in the schema....

I wish I were kidding - but I not too long ago came across a site with
a broken mail configuration - and mail to 'postmaster@' bounced due to a
'user unknown' error.  Finally got the sysadmin on the phone, and he was
*very* apologetic - a PHB had decreed that all "role" mailboxes would
be 'something-MANAGER', so mail to 'mail-manager@' would have worked.
And no, an alias redirecting 'postmaster' to there was out too, because
the PHB said that would violate the One True Name.  And no, it wasn't
likely to get fixed anytime soon, as the sysadmin was starting at
someplace else on Monday (for a manager with a clue), and the most
likely fix was the whole place dot-bombing.....

Be prepared for lots of arguments that boil down to "It should be called
'foo' because that's what it is on our database, and of COURSE we used
the best possible naming convention...."

                                Valdis Kletnieks
                                Operating Systems Analyst
                                Virginia Tech