Internic procedure problems

I've been thinking about this incident with the wrong address in the .net
domain for ns2.bc.net and I have come to the conclusion that the Internic
needs to review some of their procedures.

We recognize the problem and are making incremental improvements to the service
while attempting to keep up with the load (700 new a day on average and a high
of 900+). The next round of improvements is reserving the domain as it is sent
into our system, parsing and rejecting badly-formed templates, and running dns
sanity checks (it is in beta-test now). Internally, we have discussed this
ad-nauseam and plan on issuing a short paper on the domain processes (what we
expect from you, what to expect from us, etc). I'll announce this on the
rs-info@internic.net list as well as here. If you have any more suggestions,
I'm all ears.

problem would not occur. THis is not the first time I have encountered
such a problem. A few weeks ago I helped a small college in California
sort out a problem with their email which was the result of the incorrect
nameserver being recorded in the .ca.us domain.

This is a domain that is not administrated by us. I guess it is not just
us that is experiencing this type of problem.

Another thing that would be nice to see is some method for updating domain
information similar to the way routing policy is updated. If I wish to
change secondary nameservers, I should be able to directly update records
for my domain rather than submit an email request and wait 3-4 weeks for
an overworked human being to get around to it. This is especially
irritating for us because when we switched providers and therefore needed
to switch secondary nameservice, it only took a few days to get the
in-addr domains changed but our .net domain is dragging on forever.

You are experiencing the effects of the lastest surge of domain requests.
A month ago we almost caught up but since then have been blasted by
requests and phone calls putting us down in the hole again.

Mark

> I've been thinking about this incident with the wrong address in the .net
> domain for ns2.bc.net and I have come to the conclusion that the Internic
> needs to review some of their procedures.

The next round of improvements is reserving the domain as it is sent

If the domain has already been reserved due to another application in the
queue, will the automated reply immediately reject the application so we
know right away?

rs-info@internic.net list as well as here. If you have any more suggestions,
I'm all ears.

Along with the final domain registration notice, send a computer
generated password that the domain admin can use to log into an update
program on your machine and change their domain entry. If you want even
higher security, take those changes as being provisional, email them back
to the official admin address for the domain asking for a return mail
confirmation of the changhe similar to what First Virtual
(http://www.fv.com) does for sales transactions.

This is a domain that is not administrated by us. I guess it is not just
us that is experiencing this type of problem.

It's a statistical thing to do with the greater volume of domain
registrations and changes.

You are experiencing the effects of the lastest surge of domain requests.
A month ago we almost caught up but since then have been blasted by
requests and phone calls putting us down in the hole again.

This is why it is essential that you automate these procedures. If you
think you were blasted now, you ain't seen nuthin' yet. The net is still
growing exponentially.

If I were in your shoes, I would scrap the whole front end of the domain
application system, install a commercial database system, build an
application that people could telnet into to apply for a domain or for
domain changes, put a WWW forms interface on the same thing and charge a
processing fee for applications over the phone or via fax or via snail mail.

Email is nice for a lot of things but I think it has outlived its
usefulness as the major front end for the Internic applications.

Michael Dillon Voice: +1-604-546-8022
Memra Software Inc. Fax: +1-604-542-4130
http://www.memra.com E-mail: michael@memra.com