[db-wg] NCC still enforcing descr: content

On 07/08/2015 15:12, denis wrote:
> Hi Ingrid
> 
> On 07/08/2015 12:56, Ingrid Wijte wrote:
>> Hi Job and others,
>>
>> The reason we suggested a clean up was because it's an opportunity to
>> get rid of cruft. This is not just good housekeeping, but primarily
>> because maintaining the data comes with certain expectations from the
>> people who use it, which are often the result of habits that go back years.
>>
>> If we quietly stop enforcing the contents of descr: and don't clean up
>> anything, we are concerned this will lead to the confusion that was
>> outlined in the original post with the three alternatives: "names left
>> there will start to differ from the names in the referenced organisation
>> objects - which are enforced by RIPE NCC. It may not be clear to users
>> where to look for this information and where to change it. And it may
>> lead to situations where people wrongfully assume that the RIPE NCC is
>> still enforcing the "descr:" line."
>>
>> This is why we think option B is the clearest approach, taking all users
>> – both those who enter and use data – into account. We can start with a
>> clean slate and send a clear message to every user.
> 
> I think this is a good approach. It is not good management to leave
> redundant data in the database especially as it will diverge from the
> authoritative version of that data. People should also note that there is
> only a small window of opportunity for the RIPE NCC to do this cleanup
> effectively. That is at the moment the constraint on the "descr:" attribute
> is dropped. After that the divergence of the data will start and then it
> becomes impossible to do a full cleanup.

this is definitely the time to do this, so that the descr: hack can be
finally removed from the database.  It was only ever suitable as a
temporary workaround to handle the lack of org: objects.

Nick