phone types

[Andrei Robachevsky]

Hello Ginny,

ginny listman wrote:
> 
> On Wed, 27 Dec 2000, Wilfried Woeber, UniVie/ACOnet wrote:
> 
> > >I'm looking to clean-up the database, and one thing I would like to
> > >enforce is that phone numbers consist of the following: 01234567890+-()
> >
> >   That is probably a good idea. Whatever it is, the characterset should be
> >   uniform across the IP (and routing) registries!
> 
> Are there any other characters we should include that would take into
> consideration non-US, non-CA phone numbers?
>
> >
> > >In the future, if you fill out the phone line with something like:
> > >1-543.433.8765 (this is my pager)
> > >what gets store in the database, and displayed in whois:
> > >(543) 433-8765
> >
> >   This does not sound like a good idea to me.
> >   Throwing info away and/or re-writing user-supplied info can get you into
> >   trouble - unless you know *very* well what you are doing (e.g. by
> >   looking at very well-defined semantics).
> >
> 
> As I look at what is currently stored in the phone fields of the current
> database, making the above assumption/conversion seems reasonable.  A
> phone number should be a phone number, and not have other info stored with
> it.  It is my intention to define this semantics in our registration
> software - both web based and internal tools.  Do you have a problem with
> the format?  With or without ()?  If there is another format that is more
> socially accepted, let me know.  This format is not a definite, just an
> idea.
> 

In the RIPE Database the following syntax is accepted for phone numbers:

+ followed by numbers separated by the whitespace, "-" or ".". "()" are
also accepted. The number may be followed by the keyword "ext." and
another number (for extension).

The database software does not change the phone field in the submission
and just reports syntax error if the number does not comply to the above
rule. Preserving data in user's submission proved to be a good idea.

The RIPE community uses this syntax for several years.
 
> 
>  > >Ginny
> >
> >   Wilfried.
> >

Regards,

Andrei

--
Andrei Robachevsky
DB Group Manager
RIPE NCC