- db-wg - mailman.ripe.net

Adding nic handles to contact objects without one (72 chars/line)
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 20 Apr '99

20 Apr '99

Thou shall not send vi docs directly on a mail! At people's request here goes the mail again with sorter lines. Regards, Joao ------- Include message ------ Dear all, During the month of February the RIPE NCC, at the RIPE Database working group's request after the RIPE 32 meeting in Amsterdam, put out a proposal to add automatically generated nic handles to existing person objects that do not currently have one. Some other unrelated issues have caused me to not follow this up appropriately. I am sorry for that. In order to resume (and hopefully swiftly conclude) this issue, I will use the rest of this message to summarize the state of discussions. I would like to ask for a 10 day discussion period after which I will summarize the conclusion to the list and have the Database group take whatever action is agreed to. Summary: The initial proposal called just for the addition of an automatically generated nic handle to person and role objects which currently do not have one. This would be done using the same automatic procedure used by the Database software when a user request an AUTO nic handle. That is, the database takes up to 4 initials from the name, looks for the highest exisiting number of a nic handle in the sequence of nic handles with the same initials, generates a new number and adds the suffix "-RIPE". Input received discussed if we should use the opportunity and try to modify some database objects that reference person and role objects by name instead of nic handle as is required now in the RIPE Database. These are two separate issues. The first one could be approved without the second one. The first one alone brings old objects up to date to current specifications, simplifies the prorammers life and enables further steps to increase the DB's consistency. In my personal opinion it is a Good Thing. The main advantage of the second part is that: - References by nic handle are less ambiguous than references by name since the DB ensures that there are no duplicate nic handles whereas there is no reason why two persons can't have the same name. (Note: currently there are around 30 duplicate nic handles in the RIPE DB due to legacy objects from the past and bugs in past releases of the software. This problem is being addressed in the context of the RIPE DB consistency project. There will be an extensive report on the progress of this project in the coming RIPE meeting in Vienna). Doing this doesn't solve all the problems, naturally, and may have some problems as itemized below: - If the reference by name is to a name for which more than one object exists then there is an ambiguity that can't be handled automatically. The solution to this requires intervention by the referencing object's owner. This will be handled by the DB consistency project. - If there is no object with the referenced name then the referencing object is at least partially orphaned. This issue will also be addressed by the DB consistency project and may eventually need further policy decisions in the future, to be discussed by the community. - There is a chance that a person/role object with a refenced name exists and is unique but is not the one that created the referencing object. Eg. if I created an inetnum object in 1991 but then deleted my person object and then my twin ghost registered in the DB and created some new objects: should the original inetnum object (still in the database) be linked to my twin ghost (who probably doesn't know anything about it)? If this issue is seen as a heavy one then no name references can be modified to references by NIC handle automatically, unless an exhaustive search of the DB update logs is performed (and even then, there is no guaranteed result). I think this summarizes the state of affairs. Please give your input as soon as possible so that a conclusion can be reached. If possible, address the original and the extension proposal separately. Thanks, Joao Damas RIPE DB Group Manager RIPE NCC

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Re: Objects to deprecate (OSI dom-prefix)
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 16 Apr '99

16 Apr '99

Wearing my plain DB user hat, >the RIPE NCC hereby requests from the RIPE community to consider NOT >to support the Domain-prefix object in the new RIPE DB code currently >under development. >This would mean not writing the code to support the object and dump the data >in the transition to the new code (still a few months away). I fully support this proposal. 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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Objects to deprecate (OSI dom-prefix)
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 16 Apr '99

16 Apr '99

Dear all, the RIPE NCC hereby requests from the RIPE community to consider NOT to support the Domain-prefix object in the new RIPE DB code currently under development. This would mean not writing the code to support the object and dump the data in the transition to the new code (still a few months away). This object is intented to store OSI CLNS prefixes and has seen little use. Currently there are 6 objects of this type. The most current update took place in May 1994. The prefixes stored right now are: 39.528f.1100 39.756f.1111 39.756f 39.250f 39.250f.0000.02 39.276f.3100 in case the owners want to inspect them and check their use :-) Best regards, Joao Damas RIPE NCC

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2 digit years in the RIPE DB (Y2K)
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 16 Apr '99

16 Apr '99

Dear all, at the last RIPE meeting the Database Working group asked the RIPE NCC to propose to the community a rewrite of all dates currently stored in the RIPE Database that are using two figures for the year as dates with four figures for the year. The RIPE DB software has already been modified to avoid problems with Y2K. Changing the date format would make things cleaner and not dependant on conventions for interpretation of dates. This simplifies software development both at the RIPE NCC and by users writing their own programs. This is a rather small change although it involves modification of user data and therefore we would like to open a comment period of 10 days to see if there any user concerns about the proposed change. Best regards, Joao Damas RIPE DB Group Manager RIPE NCC

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

16 Apr '99

Dear all, During the month of February the RIPE NCC, at the RIPE Database working group's request after the RIPE 32 meeting in Amsterdam, put out a proposal to add automatically generated nic handles to existing person objects that do not currently have one. Some other unrelated issues have caused me to not follow this up appropriately. I am sorry for that. In order to resume (and hopefully swiftly conclude) this issue, I will use the rest of this message to summarize the state of discussions. I would like to ask for a 10 day discussion period after which I will summarize the conclusion to the list and have the Database group take whatever action is agreed to. Summary: The initial proposal called just for the addition of an automatically generated nic handle to person and role objects which currently do not have one. This would be done using the same automatic procedure used by the Database software when a user request an AUTO nic handle. That is, the database takes up to 4 initials from the name, looks for the highest exisiting number of a nic handle in the sequence of nic handles with the same initials, generates a new number and adds the suffix "-RIPE". Input received discussed if we should use the opportunity and try to modify some database objects that reference person and role objects by name instead of nic handle as is required now in the RIPE Database. These are two separate issues. The first one could be approved without the second one. The first one alone brings old objects up to date to current specifications, simplifies the prorammers life and enables further steps to increase the DB's consistency. In my personal opinion it is a Good Thing. The main advantage of the second part is that: - References by nic handle are less ambiguous than references by name since the DB ensures that there are no duplicate nic handles whereas there is no reason why two persons can't have the same name. (Note: currently there are around 30 duplicate nic handles in the RIPE DB due to legacy objects from the past and bugs in past releases of the software. This problem is being addressed in the context of the RIPE DB consistency project. There will be an extensive report on the progress of this project in the coming RIPE meeting in Vienna). Doing this doesn't solve all the problems, naturally, and may have some problems as itemized below: - If the reference by name is to a name for which more than one object exists then there is an ambiguity that can't be handled automatically. The solution to this requires intervention by the referencing object's owner. This will be handled by the DB consistency project. - If there is no object with the referenced name then the referencing object is at least partially orphaned. This issue will also be addressed by the DB consistency project and may eventually need further policy decisions in the future, to be discussed by the community. - There is a chance that a person/role object with a refenced name exists and is unique but is not the one that created the referencing object. Eg. if I created an inetnum object in 1991 but then deleted my person object and then my twin ghost registered in the DB and created some new objects: should the original inetnum object (still in the database) be linked to my twin ghost (who probably doesn't know anything about it)? If this issue is seen as a heavy one then no name references can be modified to references by NIC handle automatically, unless an exhaustive search of the DB update logs is performed (and even then, there is no guaranteed result). I think summarizes the state of affairs. Please give your input as soon as possible so that a conclusion can be reached. If possible, address the original and the extension proposal separately. Thanks, Joao Damas RIPE DB Group Manager RIPE NCC

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ANNOUNCEMENT: RELEASE OF IRRd-1.3-Beta
by Gerald Andrew Winters 09 Apr '99

09 Apr '99

Merit Network, Inc. is pleased to announce the first production-quality release of the Internet Routing Registry Daemon (IRRd). Source code, manuals and binaries are now *freely* available from: http://www.irrd.net IRRd is an optimized, multi-threaded IRR database server with support for a complete set of RIPE-181 registry services, including: whois queries, an interactive Cisco-like configuration/management interface, remote registry mirroring, email/tool object submissions, and password/PGP. IRRd also includes private database support, security access lists, and an expanded query language. We encourage providers actively using the RADB (and other IRR registries) in production for the generation of router access lists/config files to run a local, mirroring copy of the IRRd server. IRRd has served as the production RADB routing registry daemon since early February. Note: Complete RPSL support will be available with IRRd-2.0 (beta release scheduled for late May). If you are interested in serving as an alpha tester for IRRd-2.0 please send email to irrd-support(a)irrd.net. -- The IRRd Development Team

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Re: Modifications to the inet6num in the RIPE Database
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 18 Mar '99

18 Mar '99

Guy, Engin, thanks a lot for the explanation! Guy said: >Finally, you can only have one of these constructs per address. This is >common sense really since, if you have 3ffe::aaaa::bbbb, you cannot tell >how many zeroes are replaced with the first pair of colons and how many >by the second. There is no convention (AFAIK) for which block would be >written out in full. Personally, since I am lazy, I choose to write out >the fewer number of zeroes (remembering that I only need one zero per >block of 4 hex digits). > >So, some examples of IPv6 addresses are... > >3ffe:1100:0:c00::/52 >= Note the :0: because there is a :: later in the address Engin added: >The algorithm we use translates "5:0:0:78:0:0:0:0" >into "5:0:0:78::" but not "5::78:0:0:0:0". Of course, >both are legal, but we choose to double-colonize the >last group of zeros, and all prefixes are normalized >according to this and then put into the registry. which already gives us two compatible but different ways to deal with that, and >But I don't know what 6bone registry does. interesting, indeed. Taking this one step further, and looking back at what we did with IPv4, where it would be feasible to say 131.130/16, implying 131.130.0.0/16, I wonder if it wouldn't again be worthwhile to restrict the use of these shorthand notations in the Address Registry? Is there a danger for braking something by _not_ allowing the "::" construct in the registry at all, or - in particular - not _in the middle_ of a prefix? 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: Modifications to the inet6num in the RIPE Database
by Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet 16 Mar '99

16 Mar '99

Hi David, Joao, et.al. <disclaimer> My question is going to prove complete ignorance when it comes to IPv6 address formats. So please bear with me :-) </disclaimer> => The two suggested changes are: => => - - addition of a "status" attribute with the following possible values: => TLA, NLA and SLA. => Syntax checks will be done so that: => TLA is only allowed if the prefix length is 3<x<=16 => NLA is only allowed if the prefix length is 16<x<=48 => SLA is only allowed if the prefix length is 48<x<=64 = =This is fine although, I am not entirely convinced that we really need =it. It's a bit redundant information. By definition something is a =TLA/NLA/SLA so you can just look at the 'inet6num:' field and you =already know what it is. Can't you just generate this field =automatically ?!? For the IPv4 case we do have a well-established format for external representation of addresses and prefixes, i.e. full dotted quad with /prefix-length. In the 6bone registry there's IPv6 prefixes with a "structured" external representation, like "3FFE::/16" or "5FBC:1000::/32". So my questioon is: is there an agreed algorithm to insert punctuation at the "appropriate" positions, and does the proposal/criticism for the semantic checks do have an influence on this formatting? Thanks, 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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Modifications to the inet6num in the RIPE Database
by Joao Luis Silva Damas 15 Mar '99

15 Mar '99

Dear all, A week has passed and no comments against the proposed modifications to the IPv6 object have been put forward. Therefore we take it that everyone is happy with it and will procede with the implementation. We expect this to be available in about two weeks. The original message is repeated below for your reference. Regards, Joao Damas DB Group RIPE NCC ------- Begin Original Message From: Joao Luis Silva Damas <joao(a)ripe.net> Date: Thu, 04 Mar 1999 10:20:17 +0100 To: lir-wg(a)ripe.net, db-wg(a)ripe.net Subject: Modifications to the inet6num in the RIPE Database Dear all, below are the proposed modifications to the inet6num object in the RIPE Database as discussed during the past RIPE Meeting. These are mainly to bring the IPv6 object up to the IPv4 object's functionality. The two suggested changes are: - - addition of a "status" attribute with the following possible values: TLA, NLA and SLA. Syntax checks will be done so that: TLA is only allowed if the prefix length is 3<x<=16 NLA is only allowed if the prefix length is 16<x<=48 SLA is only allowed if the prefix length is 48<x<=64 - - addition of "mnt-lower" capabilities, as in the IPv4 object. We would like to open a comment period of 1 week from today to gather input and proceed with implementation if there is consensus. Regards, Joao Damas DB Group RIPE NCC ------- End Original Message

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Annoing lists.:(
by Irmantas Gudelis 15 Mar '99

15 Mar '99

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