[DBWG] Removing short handles in WHOIS objects

[Michel ODOU]

Hi DBWG members,

As you may know, the WHOIS allows object attributes in a short form,
though this is not clearly documented.

For example,

person:     John Doe
address:    Mauritius
phone:      tel:+230-403-5100
e-mail:     john.doe at afrinic.net
nic-hdl:    JOHNDOE
changed:    john.doe at afrinic.net 20190816
source:    AFRINIC

and

pn:    John Doe
ad:    Mauritius
ph:    tel:+230-403-5100
em:    john.doe at afrinic.net
nh:    JOHNDOE
ch:    john.doe at afrinic.net 20190816
so:    AFRINIC

are the same object.

However, as said above, this is not documented and we did not find any
object using these short form attribute names.
We would like to remove this feature for the following reasons:

 1. It is not used.
 2. Short form attribute names are difficult to read.
 3. They can break parsers/scripts that expect long form attribute names.

I you have any objection, please let us know.

Regards,
Michel
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.afrinic.net/pipermail/dbwg/attachments/20190816/f08f11a2/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 833 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <https://lists.afrinic.net/pipermail/dbwg/attachments/20190816/f08f11a2/attachment.sig>