- db-wg - mailman.ripe.net

Re: Modifying references to contact info in the RIPE DB
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

Hi Joao! >If the reference is by name then when I query the DB I will get the list of >persons with that name, right? Right. >Whether the object belongs to the person or not is not going to save this >person from being contacted. From the point of view of the database and the >user querying it, the object belongs to that person. Right >The link is via a name. > >Now we substitute the reference by name with a reference by nic handle >pointing to the same person. >What is the difference? > >ALMOST NONE except that: True, for the case where there is a strict one-to-one mapping, e.g the recursion using the name returns *one* object. What do you suggets to do with the case where the recursion, based on the names, returns a *set* of objects? I can see 2 approaches (at least): - do not perform the handle substitution for that referring object and put it on the list of those requiring human intervention - expand the xxxx-c: list (which? the tech-c:?) to refer to *all* objects, but by ref'ing their handles While human beings are quite clever in selecting the "proper" instance of a person: object (by looking at country, address, email,...) a script might be quite clueless with that respect :-) Wilfried. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wilfried Woeber : e-mail: Woeber(a)CC.UniVie.ac.at Computer Center - ACOnet : Tel: +43 1 4277 - 140 33 Vienna University : Fax: +43 1 4277 - 9 140 Universitaetsstrasse 7 : RIPE-DB (&NIC) Handle: WW144 A-1010 Vienna, Austria, Europe : PGP public key ID 0xF0ACB369 --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Re: Modifying references to contact info in the RIPE DB
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

>I explicitly excluded those objects from this run. Great. >I knew this thing was going to be a bit polemic so I am trying to split into >smaller problems and stages that we can all agree to. Well, complex, at least. I fully support your approach! >Hopefully every step will reduce the number of objects that need repairs. And >believe me, it's not the same to have to fix 250000 objects than to fix 25000. >Somehow the latter seems a bit more feasible (from a "let's deal with this" >attitude). Certainly. >So, can we agree to proceed with our suggestion as stated below? >** >Change references by names to references by nic handle where these are unique >(there are not already more than two persons with the same referenced name). >** I agree. >For the cases where the ambiguity is already there: we'll look at them, try to >categorize them Sounds interesting. I really like the approach taken by Poul-Henning with his IP address page. Maybe we can come up with a similar list, e.g. categorized by object type, and within the object type by LIR, TLD, AS-#, Maintainer... >and maybe identify another subset which can be handled by >drawing information from some other source. >We'll get back to you with our suggestion (and we take the two you mention as >input). Any input is most welcome. Wilfried.

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Re: Modifying references to contact info in the RIPE DB
by Janos Zsako 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

> From owner-db-wg(a)ripe.net Thu Jun 24 15:23:02 1999 > From: Joao Luis Silva Damas <joao(a)ripe.net> > ALMOST NONE except that: > from that point on if someone else with a name equal to one already in the > database is entered into the database the reference will not be made ambiguous > while if we leave it as a reference by name it sure becomes ambiguous. I agree with Joao that there is virtually nothing to lose. I don't think it is better to have a reference by name with a single incorrect instance of a person object with that name, rather than a NIC-handle reference to the same incorrect instance... (By incorrect instance I mean a person object with the same name, but who has nothing to do with the referring object). At the same time the benefit is obvious (see above). Also, the longer one delays this process, the better the chances to have several instances to be handled manually (i.e. to try to identify the correct person object from several ones with the same name). Just my 2 filler (.01 HUF). :)) Janos

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Re: Modifying references to contact info in the RIPE DB
by Janos Zsako 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

> From owner-db-wg(a)ripe.net Thu Jun 24 14:35:25 1999 > From: "Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet" <woeber(a)cc.univie.ac.at> > One of the key things might be to make sure that we (you :-) can perform > a roll-back, if it turns out that we've messed up things badly... My feeling is that if one replaces the name reference with the NIC-handle, at least as long as the referenced person object is not deleted (which I suppose cannot be deleted once it has an other object referencing it), the roll-back is always possible (i.e. one could re-substitute the NIC-handle with the name). Although, I feel this would be in the best case useless, since either there is no other person object with the same name, or the other object(s) was(were) added later. Janos

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Re: Modifying references to contact info in the RIPE DB
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

Hi Joao! >So, in spite of the concerns raised (valid as they are) I would still >vote to go ahead on this one as proposed. > >What do people think? Well, some as yet unstructured rants, off the top of my head... I'd love to see some sort of test-run being performed, e.g. going ahead and putting the result up as the (or an additional) test db? One of the key things might be to make sure that we (you :-) can perform a roll-back, if it turns out that we've messed up things badly... Is there any chance to do some sort of dry-run, and put up some sort of list of cases deserving investigation? Poul's page is a very good thing, indeed, although tackling a different aspect. My reasoning is that whatever can be fixed by humans, in a distributed project, before the brute-force attack would make life easier. Most probably basic rule #1 applies to my comments: use the brain before using the keyboard :-) Wilfried. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wilfried Woeber : e-mail: Woeber(a)CC.UniVie.ac.at Computer Center - ACOnet : Tel: +43 1 4277 - 140 33 Vienna University : Fax: +43 1 4277 - 9 140 Universitaetsstrasse 7 : RIPE-DB (&NIC) Handle: WW144 A-1010 Vienna, Austria, Europe : PGP public key ID 0xF0ACB369 --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Modifying references to contact info in the RIPE DB
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

Dear all, the Database consistency project has been going forward in its goals since RIPE 33 (eg. addition of nic handles to all objects without one.) Statistics and reports about the "status" of the database can be seen at http://www.ripe.net/db/state/. We will keep adding information to these pages as the project progresses. We are now at the point where we would like to tackle the issue of references by name in the admin-c, tech-c and zone-c. As a next step, we would like to have references by nic handles (which are unique) instead of references by name (which can be non -unique). At this point, we would like to automatically go through all the references by name which can uniquely be assigned to a person or role object and substitute them by references to their nic handles. This will prevent these references from becoming non-unqiue in the future. Later we will go through the process of fixing the non-unique references left in the database. This process requires user intervention since we can't decide who "owns" a particular set of resources. For this later stage, we will be preparing reports that we will send to all maintainers for whom we detect objects with inconsistencies and try to get them fixed. Information about this part will be sent to the lists in a few weeks. We would like to do this after as much as possible has been done by automatic means to correct inconsistencies so that human effort is reduced to a minimum. If there are any concerns regarding this move, please make them known before next Friday (June 25th). Looking forward to your comments, Joao Damas Database Group RIPE NCC

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Changing old format dates in the RIPE DB
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 24 Jun '99

24 Jun '99

Dear all, we are going to start with the procedure to modify all the dates in the changed fields of database objects that were using only two figures for the year. After the modifications, the year part of the date will contain 4 digits. Changed fields which currently do not have a date will not be changed (*) This is taking place according to the action points agreed on the Vienna RIPE meeting. The process will be carried over the next few days due to the time it takes to re-index some of the bigger files. Regards, Joao Damas DB Group RIPE NCC (*) These objects will not be updatable by the user unless a date is included at update time or the only changed field without a date is the last one, in which case the database automatically fills in the date at which the update takes place.

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Update processing delayed
by RIPE Database Administration 22 Jun '99

22 Jun '99

Dear Colleagues, the database is very loaded now, due to some huge updates sent tonight. The queue of waiting updates is very long and you should be prepered for waiting times of several hours before your update gets processed. Please do not resend your updates. Thank you for your patience. If you have any questions, please contact <ripe-dbm(a)ripe.net>. Regards, Roman Karpiuk ____________________________ The RIPE NCC Database Group.

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Adding nic handles to objects without one
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 16 Jun '99

16 Jun '99

Dear all, as discussed and agreed to during discussions in the mailing lists and at the RIPE Meeting in Vienna, the RIPE NCC will be adding newly generated NIC handles to person objects that do not currently have one. Over the last days we have been testing the procedures to do this in a non-disruptive way. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the current database, the process needs about 5 hours to run. Due to this and to avoid interactions with nightly jobs that create several copies of the files, including the ftp site and the full text search indexes, we will stop updates tomorrow Tuesday at 19:00 (Amsterdam time). This will cause all updates to the DB sent after 19:00 to be queued for later processing that night. There is no need to send updates more than once. Queries will not be affected. That is, the whois server will keep answering queries normally. During the process, objects without nic handles will get unique new ones and also a "changed" attribute will be added with tomorrow's data and ripe-dbm(a)ripe.net as the author of the change. This is for future reference. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us. Best regards, Joao Damas DB Group RIPE NCC

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RE: status on RIPE-DB rewrite
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 07 Jun '99

07 Jun '99

Rick, >can anyone give a status on the ripe-db rewrite in 'C' http://www.ripe.net/meetings/ripe/ripe-33/pres/db-reimpl/index.html might provide you with some answers. I'm sure RIPE NCC staff can give more details, if required. Wilfried. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wilfried Woeber : e-mail: Woeber(a)CC.UniVie.ac.at Computer Center - ACOnet : Tel: +43 1 4277 - 140 33 Vienna University : Fax: +43 1 4277 - 9 140 Universitaetsstrasse 7 : RIPE-DB (&NIC) Handle: WW144 A-1010 Vienna, Austria, Europe : PGP public key ID 0xF0ACB369 --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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