[ppml] Last Call for Comment: Policy Proposal 2003-5

[Larry J. Blunk]

> On Tue, 22 Apr 2003 Michael.Dillon at radianz.com wrote:
> 
> > >I was given an augument against making it generic since ARIN only
> > >allows for ip reassignment information to be of the form of a SWIP or
> > >RWhois server. If ARIN allows for another form of distributed lookup
> > >service such as using a LDAP based service (like referral LDAP) or XML 
> > based 
> > >service (like IRIS), then it should be made more general at that point.
> > 
> > I strenuously disagree.
> > 
> > ARIN policies should not contain irrelevant details. In this case, SWIP 
> > and Rwhois are irrelevant details.
> > 
> > The root purpose of this policy is to specify that organizations who have 
> > received IP address space must keep track of where they are used (maintain 
> > an IP address directory) and must publish the directory of IP address 
> > usage. They can choose to either publish the directory by submitting 
> > regular updates to ARIN for inclusion in a central directory or they can 
> > publish the directory themselves by maintaining a publicly accessible 
> > server connected to the Internet 24/7.
> 
> whois is the accepted format...whether you swip your data and have ARIN 
> add it to their whois server or you run your own, it's the only protocol 
> currently approved.  whois clients are fairly ubiquitous.  I don't have to 
> know anything about the protocol other than "it's whois" to use a whois 
> client.

   C&W and ARIN made a presentation at the Las Vegas ARIN meeting last year
about C&W using their RPSL-based whois server to report address
usage (through RPSL "inetnum" objects).  The presentation can be found at
http://www.arin.net/library/minutes/ARIN_IX/Reporting_Utilization.pdf
I'm not sure of the status of this project (Tanya? Michael?) or whether
ARIN plans to allow such reporting outside of C&W.   While the C&W
server uses the whois "protocol" (a TCP pipe on port 43), the RPSL
format is considerably different than the output format of RWhois.

   I'd be careful about substituting the term "whois" for "RWhois" as
it might imply the usage of RPSL whois servers (in addition to RWhois
servers) is considered acceptable by ARIN.  I think there should be
a more formal decision on whether RPSL whois servers are
acceptable before generalizing the policy to include any "whois"
service (and, by extension, LDAP/XML/etc. services).

> If you publish your reassignment data in an LDAP server, how do I access 
> it?  How do I find out how to access it?
> 
> If someone else chooses to "publish" their reassignment data in some
> obscure CGI deep in their web site and forces anyone who wants to look up
> an IP to jump through many hoops to get at the data, what then?
> 
> If you want to leave the method of reassignment data publication open, 
> then you're going to have to define a minimum set of guidelines that the 
> method of publication must meet to qualify.
>  

   I concur with this.   Perhaps the policy could refer to some other
document or policy which contains the guidelines for acceptable
publication protocols and formats?


 -Larry Blunk
  Merit