------------------------------------------------------------------- APNIC Document identity Title: APNIC Registry Database Record Addition, Modification and Deletion Instructions Short title: database-update-info Document ref: APNIC-057 Version: 001 Date of original publication: 31 May 1997 Date of this version: 31 May 1997 Review scheduled: n/a Obsoletes: APNIC-044 Status: Obsolete Comments: Obsoleted by APNIC-067 -------------------------------------------------------------------- APNIC Registry Database Record Addition, Modification and Deletion Instructions Issued: May 31, 1997 Expires: December 31, 1997* *) This form is valid until superseded by another form. After the date specified, please check the APNIC document store located at ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/database-update-info for a later version of this document. 1.0 Introduction ---------------- These instructions describe how to add, modify, or delete records in the APNIC Registry Database. Please see comments at the bottom of this form regarding how to complete the necessary templates to add, modify or delete your records. Note that the templates described in this form are parsed by machine and modification of lines starting with #[ or field names will likely result in strange errors being returned to you and your request not being processed. After completing this form, please submit it via email to: auto-dbm@rs.apnic.net or in type written English via fax (discouraged) to: +81-3-5500-0481 or in type written English via postal mail (as a last resort) to: Asia Pacific Network Information Center Tokyo Central Post Office Box 351 Tokyo, 100-91, Japan Note that requests submitted via fax and/or postal mail require significant hand processing and will thus incur significant delays. Please allow up to one month for processing fax or postal mail requests. Electronic requests will be processed immediately unless the database is being re-indexed in which case your request will be queued until the indexing finishes. If you do not receive a response from the APNIC Database system within 24 hours, please contact the APNIC database administrator at apnic-dbm@apnic.net. The APNIC Registration database is based on software originally written at the European registry, RIPE-NCC. Each record in the database is composed of a series of fields separated by one or more blank lines and each field consists of two parts, the "tag" and the "value". You should not modify the tags as they appear in the fields or errors will be returned when you submit your update. Values for particular fields are specified in templates and care must be taken to insure appropriate values are specified. The first line of a template denotes the record type, e.g., an IP address template's first line is 'inetnum', thus the record is known as an "inetnum object". This first line is also used as the primary key for the record, thus should you wish to modify the first field of the record, the only possible way to do so will be to delete the record entirely and add a new record with the corrected information. If you have any questions, you may contact us via email at hostmaster@apnic.net (preferred), fax at the above number, postal mail at the above address or via telephone at +81-3-5500-0480. Note that updates to the APNIC registration database are not accepted via telephone. 2.0 Adding New Records ---------------------- When a service provider has assigned address space to a customer, the service provider must update the APNIC Registration Database to indicate the contact information for the organization to which the addresses have been reassigned. In addition, from time to time, it may be necessary for an organization to add additional person records which reflect changes in contact people for particular resources. This section documents how additional records may be added to the APNIC database. The addition of records can be broken down into three steps: 1) Obtaining NIC handles as necessary 2) Filling in the fields for the new record you wish to add to the database 3) Submitting the request to auto-dbm@rs.apnic.net and receiving a response. Depending on the response generated by the automatic database software, it may be necessary to modify and resubmit your request should errors be generated. 2.1 Obtaining a NIC handle -------------------------- As multiple individuals may have the same name, it is necessary to have a unique identifier which can be used to match a particular individual. These unique identifiers are known as "NIC handles". Each regional registry has their own NIC handles, with the APNIC NIC handles being of the form: -AP where: is the person's given name initial is the person's family name initial is a sequence number used to uniquely identify people with the same initials -AP is the tag denoting this handle is maintained at APNIC. If a contact person is being added to the APNIC registration database for the first time, you will need to obtain an APNIC NIC handle for the contact. Before obtaining an APNIC NIC handle, please attempt to verify the person does not already have a NIC handle by querying the APNIC database via your WHOIS command. If the person truly does not have a NIC handle, then you can use your finger commmand (or telnet to port 79) to rs.apnic.net, querying the person's given name followed by their family name separated by a '.'. For example, if you need to allocate a handle for John Doe, you can issue the following command: finger john.doe@rs.apnic.net The APNIC finger server will find the next available NIC handle in the format JDn-AP (where 'n' is some number) and reserve that handle for one week. If you do not submit your reassignment within one week, the NIC handle reserved will be returned to the 'free pool'. PLEASE INSURE YOU SUBMIT THE REASSIGNMENT WITHIN ONE WEEK AFTER RESERVING THE NIC HANDLE. For more information on the APNIC Registration Services finger ser- vice, you can issue the following command: finger help@rs.apnic.net and a short description of the services provided by the APNIC finger server will be returned to you. 2.2 Filling in the new record fields ------------------------------------ Step two will entail supplying values for (at a minimum) all mandatory fields for the appropriate record. In general, the only records you will need to add are 'INETNUM' objects when you update the APNIC database to document the reassignment of addresses to a customer or 'PERSON' objects when you add an additional contact person. 2.2.1 INETNUM Records --------------------- In the case of an address assignment, you will need to supply values for the following fields: inetnum: netname: descr: country: admin-c: tech-c: changed: mnt-by: source: APNIC All fields, with the exception of the INETNUM field, are documented in the IP address request forms ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/isp-address-request ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/end-user-address-request ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/confed-address-request Please see any of those forms for details on the proper values for those fields. The values for the ADMIN-C and TECH-C fields should be obtained in step one *** DO NOT USE A PERSON'S NAME FOR THE ADMIN-C OR TECH-C FIELDS ***. The INETNUM field contains the range of IP address space. The syntax of this attribute can be either of the following: inetnum: 192.87.45.0 This indicates 8 bits of host address (one class C network number), which covers IP address space 192.87.45.0 up to 192.87.45.255. The network number can be a class A, class B or class C network number. inetnum: 192.87.44.0 - 192.87.45.0 This indicates 9 bits of host address (a block of two (2) class C network numbers), which covers IP address space 192.87.44.0 up to 192.87.45.255. The spaces between the beginning address, the dash ("-") and the end address of this classful range must be present. The range can consist of any block of class A, class B or class C network numbers. inetnum: 192.87.45.0 - 192.87.45.255 This notation represents a classless range of IP address space, and does not make any assumptions on the class (A, B or C) of this specific piece of address space. Where this above example covers exactly the same address space as the first classful class C example, it is only in this syntax possible to specify any other range of address space that is not aligned on the conventional class A, B or C boundaries. Please also note that in the dotted quad notation of IP addresses, all trailing zeros must be present. 2.2.2 PERSON Records -------------------- In the case of person records, you will need to supply values for the following fields: person: address: country: phone: nic-hdl: changed: mnt-by: source: APNIC with optional fields of: fax-no: e-mail: All fields are documented in the IP address request forms ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/isp-address-request ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/end-user-address-request ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/confed-address-request Please see any of those forms for details on the proper values for those fields. 2.3 Submitting the request -------------------------- After completing the record corresponding to the new object you wish to add to the database, you will need to submit the request to the APNIC automated database software. Currently, this software handles email requests sent to the address: auto-dbm@rs.apnic.net After submitting the request, the template will be scanned for syntax errors and, if no errors are found, the appropriate changes will be immediately made to the APNIC Registration database. Note that all updates are logged within APNIC to insure that erroneous or malicious updates can be detected and corrected. After submitting your template via email, you should receive back a response from the database server. If any errors were detected in your submission, NO CHANGES WILL BE MADE to the APNIC Registration database and you will need to submit your application again. If non-fatal errors are detected, the database software will flag the errors as 'warnings' and return your template. Note however that warnings are only advisory and your update will be accepted in the database (perhaps with some modifications as noted in the warning message(s)). It is recommended that in future submissions you correct the specific problems which generated the warnings prior to submitting a new update. If no errors or warnings are detected in your template, a short confirmation message will be returned. If you believe your submission was rejected erroneously or you have any questions regarding your submission, please contact APNIC at apnic-dbm@apnic.net. 3.0 Modifying an Object ----------------------- The easiest way to modify an object would be to obtain the record for modification via WHOIS, make the necessary modifications and submit the modified record to auto-dbm@rs.apnic.net. APNIC requests the addition of changed fields whenever a record is modified, e.g., instead of replacing a CHANGED field with the new email address and date, a second changed field would be added. For example, if Jon Doe has the existing record in the APNIC database: person: Jon Doe address: Big Computer Company address: 13201 Taney Dr address: Beltsville, Big City country: VU phone: +98-7654-3210 fax-no: +98-7654-3211 e-mail: jd@bcc.vu nic-hdl: JD1-AP changed: jd@abcc.vu 960401 mnt-by: MAINT-BCC-AP source: APNIC and his telephone number changes to +98-1234-5789, the following record would be submitted to reflect the change: person: Jon Doe address: Big Computer Company address: 13201 Taney Dr address: Beltsville, Big City country: VU phone: +98-1234-5789 fax-no: +98-7654-3211 e-mail: jd@bcc.vu nic-hdl: JD1-AP changed: jd@bcc.vu 960401 changed: jd@bcc.vu 960601 mnt-by: MAINT-BCC-AP source: APNIC After completing the record with appropriate modifications, you will need to submit the request to the APNIC automated database software. Currently, this software handles email requests sent to the address: auto-dbm@rs.apnic.net After submitting the request, the template will be scanned for syntax errors and, if no errors are found, the appropriate changes will be immediately made to the APNIC Registration database. Note that all updates are logged within APNIC to insure that erroneous or malicious updates can be detected and corrected. After submitting your template via email, you should receive back a response from the database server. If any errors were detected in your submission, NO CHANGES WILL BE MADE to the APNIC Registration database and you will need to submit your application again. If non-fatal errors are detected, the database software will flag the errors as 'warnings' and return your template. Note however that warnings are only advisory and your update will be accepted in the database (perhaps with some modifications as noted in the warning message(s)). It is recommended that in future submissions you correct the specific problems which generated the warnings prior to submitting a new update. If no errors or warnings are detected in your template, a short confirmation message will be returned. If you believe your submission was rejected erroneously or you have any questions regarding your submission, please contact APNIC at apnic-dbm@apnic.net. 4.0 Deleting an Object ---------------------- To delete an object, you should first obtain the object to be deleted via the WHOIS protocol, then append the following field to the record (with no blank lines intervening): delete: where is the email address you normally receive mail at. For example, if Jon Doe wanted to delete his record, he could submit the following update: person: Jon Doe address: Big Computer Company address: 13201 Taney Dr address: Beltsville, Big City country: VU phone: +98-7654-3210 fax-no: +98-7654-3211 e-mail: jd@bcc.vu nic-hdl: JD1-AP changed: jd@abcc.vu 960401 mnt-by: MAINT-BCC-AP source: APNIC delete: jd@bcc.vu Note however that this does not modify the records which Jon Doe's handle is referenced, thus it will be necessary to update those records as well. 5.0 Authorization and Authentication ------------------------------------ Currently, the APNIC Database authorization and authentication mechanisms use the "Maintainer Object" described in ftp://ftp.apnic/apnic/docs/maintainer-request. Prior to the modifications or deletions being processed, the APNIC database softwar will check the MNT-BY fields of the object to be updated and apply the appropriate authenticity verification mechanisms defined in that object. Note that these verification mechanisms are far from fool proof and are primarily intended to defeat accidental erroneous updates -- they should not be relied upon to securely protect records. You should periodically review records you have registered within the APNIC database and notify APNIC should you detect anything amiss. APNIC maintains extensive update logs to help track down erroneous updates should this be necessary. For more information on the APNIC "Maintainer Object", please see ftp://ftp.apnic.net/apnic/docs/maintainer-request 6.0 Acknowledgements -------------------- This document in derived in large part from documents written by the staff of the European Registry, RIPE-NCC . In addition, the software APNIC uses is derived from software developed by RIPE-NCC.