Re: [ga] whois.txt, ala robots.txt, as a standard ?

[Joe Baptista <baptista@dot-god.com>]

Putting zone contact information into the zone itself works wonderfully
and karl is right on to use it.

Some tlds in the inclusive namespace /alt roots system use the following
format to provide information on the tld.

god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='org' value='The dot.GOD Registry, Limited'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='poc' value='Joe Baptista, Managing Director'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='url' value='http://www.dot-god.com'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='whois' value='whois.dot-god.com'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='email' value='baptista@dot-god.com'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='tel' value='+1 (705) 872-1310'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "<tldtag field='fax' value='+1 (775) 257-9422'>"
god.   86400   IN TXT     "Copyright (c) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 Peterborough Mission of GOD"

One super thing about dns txt information is that it's a great way to use
the dns to build lists and decentralize the database - like the dns i
guess.

we use it to build lists of whois servers for inclusive namespace domains.

regards
joe baptista

Joe Baptista - only at www.baptista.god

                               Dot CAM Domains http://www.dot.cam/
 All about domains in .cAm.
                               an Inclusive NameSpace Provider

On Tue, 4 Feb 2003, Karl Auerbach wrote:

>
> There is a rough convention about putting a zone's contact information
> into the zone records itself.  This convention is not much used and the
> formats are not universally applied, and credit for the idea has been
> attributed to several different people.
>
> For example, in my cavebear.com zone, I have a set of TXT records that may
> be retrieved by doing a TXT record query to "whois.cavebear.com".
>
> The result you will get is
>
> ;; ANSWER SECTION:
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"fax-number: +1.831.423.8357"
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"phone-number: +1.831.423.8585"
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"address-1: 218 Carbonera Drive"
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"address-2: Santa Cruz, CA 95060-1500"
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"other-stuff: This site is operated by Karl Auerbach"
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"address-3: USA"
> whois.cavebear.com.	172800	IN	TXT	"company-name: CaveBear"
>
> Some folks have adopted a more XML-like representation in the TXT records.
>
> The amount of text per name is limited, but with enough names and TXT
> records even large documents can be expressed.  For those who want to give
> it a whirl, run the following query and see what you get (expect about
> 525 lines of output).
>
> 	dig @npax.cavebear.com mc.cavebear.com axfr
>
> The mechanism of putting the information into the zone itself lets the
> zone owner control exactly what is, or is not, published.
>
> The point of all of this is that there is no need of a public "whois" at
> all.  Sure, the registration businesses can keep their internal business
> records about who signed up for what and when they need to be rebilled to
> prevent the domain name remover from removing their domain names.  But
> those records need not be made available to the public, to those who mine
> data, or those who make claims they have special privleges to look.  And
> Trademark people can be, as they ought to be, required to demonstrate to a
> neutral magistrate that there is enough evidence of harm to the trademark
> owner's interests for them to have a peek at the registration data.
>
> 		--karl--
>
>
>
>
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