Subject: RPSL Transition

From: Gerald Andrew Winters <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 26 Oct 1999 15:48:19 -0400 (EDT)

A reminder for users of the RADB database service:  at 12:00:00 a.m. EDT
on November 1, 1999, the whois.radb.net and [email-masked] services
will default to the Routing Policy Specification Language (RPSL) database.
This means that whois queries to whois.radb.net after November 1 will
return RPSL objects. 

RIPE-181 queries will still be possible after November 1 via whois queries
to whois-ripe181.radb.net.  However, you will need to *RECONFIGURE* your
tools to explicitly query whois-ripe181.radb.net and send RIPE-181
submissions to auto-ripe181.radb.net.

RIPE-181 submissions made between 11/1/1999 and 1/1/2000 will be visible
on whois.radb.net as RIPE-181 objects converted to RPSL.  The objects will
be converted every five minutes from the whois-ripe181.radb.net database.
Availability of the database in both syntax languages will ease the
transition to RPSL by allowing users to view RIPE-181 objects converted to
RPSL.  

fter January 1, 2000, RIPE-181 object submissions will no longer be
accepted.

Here is the full transition schedule:

        DATE                    CHANGE
        ----                    ------
        9/1/1999                RADB begins production RPSL service
                                and enters the final stage of RPSL
                                transition. RPSL queries are available
                                from whois-rpsl.radb.net and submissions
                                may be sent to [email-masked].
                                RIPE-181 and RPSL databases
                                operate in parallel.
                                whois.radb.net and [email-masked]
                                default to RIPE-181. 
                                
        11/1/1999               Default whois.radb.net and
                                [email-masked] addresses change to 
                                RPSL database. RIPE-181 queries still 
                                possible via whois-ripe181.radb.net and
                                RIPE-181 submissions still possible via
                                email to [email-masked]. 
                                
				[email-masked] submissions will
                                be auto-converted to RPSL and mirrored
                                to the RPSL database every 5 minutes.
                                Therefore, auto-converted RIPE-181 
                                submissions will be visible on 
                                whois.radb.net and corresponding RPSL
                                entries may be overwritten.

        1/1/2000                RIPE-181 queries and submissions are no 
                                longer accepted and the RADB RPSL
                                transition is complete.  

RADB users can query RPSL objects by issuing the following query:

                whois -h whois-rpsl.radb.net

Objects may be submitted by sending mail to:

                [email-masked]

Users may also use the Web-based GUI interface at:

                http://www.radb.net/irrj.html

RPSL RFCs and Internet-Drafts are available through:

                http://www.ietf.org/html.charters/rps-charter.html

Comments or questions about the transition are welcome; please send email
to [email-masked]. 

--Gerald Winters
  Merit IRRd Team