On Sun, 15 Apr 2007, michael.dillon@bt.com wrote:
As a result, most people consider William Leibzon and the Bogon project to be, collectively, the authoritative source for information on whose IP address that is. That's because William and the Bogon project, act authoritative, and take some pains to provide comprehensive data. At the
Please do not confuse 'consistent interface' with 'authoritative'.
Why doesn't IANA operate a whois server?
They do. The question you want to ask is "Why doesn't IANA operate a whois server with IP address information?", and the answer to that involves a number of brick walls and bleeding heads over a number of years.
Why don't they publish a more detailled explanation field in each IANA allocation record so that they can explain the precise status of each block?
IANA's role in this should be 'Ugh. Here Big Block. Go Talk to RIR.' imo of course ;)
Why doesn't IANA and the RIRs collectively get off their butts and actually make an "authoritative IP address allocation directory" one of their goals?
Been There, Done that. See each RIR's FTP site, updated daily. There's even a standardised format between the RIRs, unlike the whois output. --==-- Bruce.