Prototype of Whois Server with Revised Parser

Colleagues,

The Whois query parser for the RIPE Database Server has been revised
to be more consistent and helpful to users.

In the new version, inconsistent queries and invalid input will be 
detected and reported to the user, rather than silently processed.
Users may see different results for inproperly formatted queries; 
some may result in an error message, and some will be processed with
an appropriate warning.

The idea is to be as clear as possible, but some users may be 
confused, and tools may break.

We would like your feedback on the changes, so that we can modify the
behaviour to provide the clearest and most useful results.
Accordingly, we are now running a prototype of the Whois server with
the revised parser. It is a mirror of the production server, meaning
that it will provide the same results for queries, except where the
parser is different.

Usage:

To access this server, use "whois-beta.ripe.net" as your Whois server.
Except as noted on the web page below, queries behave identically to 
the production server.

For full details, please see:

http://www.ripe.net/ripencc/pub-services/db/whois-prototype-2002.html


Feedback:

Please send any comments or suggestions to <dbrip at ripe.net>, or
discuss on the Database Working Group mailing list:

http://www.ripe.net/ripe/wg/db/index.html

We look forward to your feedback.

--
Shane Kerr
Database Group
RIPE NCC