.42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain • Hacker News Board

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#21

Post by etherealG » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 3:05 PM UTC

zck wrote: post #7

rpledge wrote: post #5

So if my IP is XXX.XXX.XXX.42 I can expect misconfigured clients to be trying to connect to me constantly? What could possible go wrong!

Well, only if someone tries to go to http://XXX.XXX.XXX.42 , which seems rare. I can't think of a way to tell whether XXX.XXX.XXX.42 is an IP or a website from that string alone. You could require that no subdomain has four "parts" (i.e., A.B.C.42), but that's harsh. You could require that somewhere in the URL for a four-part numeric-TLD URL there be a character. You could also require that at least one of the parts…

reading the rules from an rfc mentioned on the wiki, if XXX.XXX.XXX.42 is a valid IP address, the client should try to use that first, if not it should only then try to use DNS to resolve.

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#22

Post by zck » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 3:17 PM UTC

etherealG wrote: post #21

zck wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, only if someone tries to go to http://XXX.XXX.XXX.42 , which seems rare. I can't think of a way to tell whether XXX.XXX.XXX.42 is an IP or a website from that string alone. You could require that no subdomain has four "parts" (i.e., A.B.C.42), but that's harsh. You could require that somewhere in the URL for a four-part numeric-TLD URL there be a character. You could also require that at least one of the parts…

reading the rules from an rfc mentioned on the wiki, if XXX.XXX.XXX.42 is a valid IP address, the client should try to use that first, if not it should only then try to use DNS to resolve.

That certainly works, but it seems like a large part of this market would want numeric-only URLs, and so you couldn't have e.g., 1.2.3.4, or 1.1.2.3, etc.

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#23

Post by gimpf » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 3:46 PM UTC

dedward wrote: post #15

split-DNS is not the answer.

That depends very much on the question. If I just want THE ANSWER as my tld, and care about nothing else, then it IS the answer.

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#24

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 4:33 PM UTC

moe wrote: post #4

Before anyone wonders: No, this isn't an official TLD. The domains you register there won't resolve for anyone unless they futz with their nameserver settings. I'm not sure what to make of this. Looks like a bunch of hackers got really bored and perhaps had a beer too many...

[deleted]

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#25

Post by jws » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 4:34 PM UTC

Now you can find all of the software that used a regex on [.0-9]+ to decide if you gave them an IP or a name.

I would never have done that… on any software that is still in service, to my knowledge.

Edit: The right way is not to try to determine which it is, pass it to inet_pton() on the assumption that it is a numeric address. If that fails, then pass it in to getaddrinfo() to let DNS or whatever the host uses for names have a crack at it. gethostbyname is obsolete now.

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#26

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 5:00 PM UTC

[deleted] wrote: post #24

moe wrote: post #4

Before anyone wonders: No, this isn't an official TLD. The domains you register there won't resolve for anyone unless they futz with their nameserver settings. I'm not sure what to make of this. Looks like a bunch of hackers got really bored and perhaps had a beer too many...

[deleted]

[deleted]

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#27

Post by beaumartinez » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 5:34 PM UTC

chaosmachine wrote: post #3

I can only imagine how many regexes this will break.

Now they have three problems...

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#28

Post by nickknw » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 5:43 PM UTC

zck wrote: post #22

etherealG wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

reading the rules from an rfc mentioned on the wiki, if XXX.XXX.XXX.42 is a valid IP address, the client should try to use that first, if not it should only then try to use DNS to resolve.

That certainly works, but it seems like a large part of this market would want numeric-only URLs, and so you couldn't have e.g., 1.2.3.4, or 1.1.2.3, etc.

> but it seems like a large part of this market would want numeric-only URLs

Except for maybe douglasadams.42 ;)

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#29

Post by jtbigwoo » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 5:57 PM UTC

bellaire wrote: post #18

rick_2047 wrote: post #9

Why 42. Most of the early would be hackers and geeks and a prime number would seem way better.

Agreed, and as above, 42 is in the valid range for the 'D' part of an A.B.C.D ipv4 address. If the number were larger than 255, there would be no issue. How about 420? ... Okay, okay. 421 is prime.

I bet 420 would quickly pass .coop and .aero...

Re: .42: new experimental, all numeric top-level domain

#30

Post by endtime » Fri, Feb 04, 2011, 5:57 PM UTC

tonyskn wrote: post #20

rst wrote: post #16

The really interesting thing here is the alternate DNS root that hosts the gimmick TLD. But it's not the first (remember AlterNIC?). Getting involved with this will teach you about DNS, and that's probably the best reason to do it --- but there are risks. (Frex, you're implicitly trusting whoever's running it to direct you back to the mainstream root servers for ".com", and not to an alternate ".com" on which selecte…

They do not seem to be hosting an alternate root themselves. They rely on http://wiki.global-anycast.net/index.php/Main_Page

Oh, well if the person you're worried might redirect you to a hostile site says they won't, I guess you're safe.