misleading use of the connect: field in inetnum: object

Hi,

in response to Wilfried Woeber's message on misleading "connect" field
tags, I can tell you a little about the practices I personally try to
adhere to when first assigning a network and later when connectivity is
applied for.

When the network is assigned, I always submit the registration request with
"connect: LOCAL".  Later, when (and if) I apply for wider connectivity for
the network, I (at the same time) send in another update, stating the
applied-for connectivity (as a matter of fact, I have started using the
RIPE "inetnum" form as the application itself, simply CC:'ing my next
higher authority in the chain to gain whatever connectivity is desired).
The use of "LOCAL" could be discussed -- in my case I interpret it as
"local to a single AS", which may not be the original intent of the flag,
but there's no UNINETT flag defined, so...

As for tagging with service provider, I never use the "bdrygw-l" flag, I
stick to the "aut-sys" flag instead (I thought the "bdrygw-l" flag was
deprecated by now, and we'll soon have to tag with aut-sys anyway).  At
what moment the network receives the "aut-sys" flag varies -- sometimes
from the beginning, sometimes later.

I beleive this is sensible practice, no?  I'm not sure if these (or
similar) practices have been documented, but if not, I agree, it should
probably be stated somewhere.  (But then again, keeping the database in sync
with reality is really the duty of the people submitting information to the
database, which should go without saying...)


- Havard