Network Solutions loses domain data -- Follow-up (fwd)

[Michael Dillon <michael@memra.com>]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 14 Jul 1999 01:54:11 -0400
From: Daniel Senie <dts@senie.com>
To: nanog@merit.edu
Subject: Network Solutions loses domain data -- Follow-up


This is a follow-up to a message I posted earlier today. After a 24 hour
absence from the root name servers, the missing domain (senie.com) has
once again appeared.

The lesson to be learned, it would seem, is to avoid doing domain
updates around the time Network Solutions generates the root zone files
(around 5PM Eastern Time). If I had to wager a guess, I'd suspect
they've got a database/programming access issue. I suspect my record was
being updated by one program, and thus was locked, at the moment another
program was trying to run a report which generates the zone files. I
tried to find someone at Network Solutions to mention this to, but there
wasn't a clueful person in the dozen or so I talked with. Indeed, most
of them didn't understand the relationship between their databases and
the root name servers (I think some of them didn't know what the root
name servers were).

Given a total lack of accountability to anyone, and software that's
clearly got some interesting bugs, it's kind of surprising more folks
don't get clobbered by this sort of thing (perhaps they do, but don't
notice the occasional 24 hour dropout).

The sad thing is that competitive registries will likely only make
things worse. In that case, you'll yell at the folks you registered
with, and they would then have to yell at Network Solutions, who're
going to maintain the database with the same buggy software. Sounds like
a mess.

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Daniel Senie                                        dts@senie.com
Amaranth Networks Inc.            http://www.amaranthnetworks.com