How do we know that as these searches are executed that the domain names don't become unavailable, because someone parks on them? That historically has been the problem with domain-name searches. I'd like an absolute guarantee that the searching is done in a manner that doesn't alert registrars or their cronies to new domain names to park on before running many searches here.
The application is a text-searching application, so I was a bit startled to see "consonant" misspelled as "constonant" throughout the pull-down menus. Usually I expect programmers who work with text string-matching to be attentive to details of natural language text.
I'm not seeing anything on zegup which allows you to even indicate from the list which domains you might be interested in. (Unlike LDS where you can go and register and click on something). Not that they won't add some way to mark a domain of course or allow you to register.
For speed purposes they should be FIRST running this check on yesterday's zone files from each registry (Verisign for .com/net for example). If that fails (shows in the zone file) no need to go further.
After that check if a name does show as available you do a whois against the appropriate registry NOT a REGISTRAR (because there is no reason to do that).
As step 1 if you don't have access to the zone file you can do a nslookup to see if the domain resolves. If it doesn't you can then check the registry (by the way PIR (.org) rate limits checks unless you are white listed).
Theoretically if a registrar has access to zegup they could front run domains IF the user of zegup indicated which domains they were interested in. Otherwise to many names to be of value in front running the way I see the site operating.
Of course there is nothing to prevent a registrar from putting up a man in the middle site (like zegup) hosted elsewhere and grabbing domains and doing what you are saying. So there is no way to "guarantee" what you are asking other than the reputation of the person running the "zegup" type site.
As an aside zegup.com was registered recently and has domain privacy. So even though whois can be faked privacy info when you are runnning a business is a bad idea.
Domain Name: ZEGUP.COM
Registrant:
PrivacyProtect.org
Domain Admin (contact@privacyprotect.org)
ID#10760, PO Box 16
Note - All Postal Mails Rejected, visit Privacyprotect.org
Nobby Beach
null,QLD 4218
AU
Tel. +45.36946676
I personally don't feel that this is a reason for concern (very very small chance but yes it is possible). But there is a faster way anyway, cutting out web server not responding etc.
So in any case if you wanted to lessen that chance you could query any public nameserver, assuming you can trust that nameserver.
In a command window, using nslookup as an example, the process would be (using google public dns server but you can use anything that's the point):
nslookup
> server 8.8.8.8
Default server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
> skymarshal.com
Server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
Non-authoritative answer:
Name: skymarshal.com
Address: 208.91.197.26 (comment: name taken!)
> skymarshalxyz.com
Server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
server can't find skymarshalxyz.com: NXDOMAIN
> www.skymarkshalxyz.com (I made this up)
Server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
server can't find www.skymarkshalxyz.com: NXDOMAIN
> exit
"can't find" - name might be available - we have determined it's not resolving. Could be a dns issue of course but it's a good first step.
Doing with a browser can give you MORE of a false positive. DNS could respond with an address but the site could be down. Of course getting no response to DNS doesn't ALWAYS mean the domain is available but it's generally fairly accurate. At that point you would do a whois to confirm.
You can write a shell script of course to automate this from the command line.
That appears to be using nslookup (edit-"esq") to see if the domain resolves as a result of a test that I just ran. (Tried a name not in the zone file that IS taken (4L .com) - edit: it said it was available. Then tried a name that wasn't in the zone file and it took some time to determine if it was available. If it was comparing to the zone file there would be essentially no delay it would be a simple search. If I wanted to prove this I could register a name NOW, do the dns, and then do a query but I don't have time to do that. The zone file is only available once per day for download.
Also, it doesn't work for anything other than .com.
And if you hit "search" it sends you to godaddy.
All in all I think it makes more sense to simply find a dns server that you can trust OR get a hold of the zone file and query that (safest way actually). My personal feeling though is that this is all a non-issue.
Comments
How do we know that as these searches are executed that the domain names don't become unavailable, because someone parks on them? That historically has been the problem with domain-name searches. I'd like an absolute guarantee that the searching is done in a manner that doesn't alert registrars or their cronies to new domain names to park on before running many searches here.
The application is a text-searching application, so I was a bit startled to see "consonant" misspelled as "constonant" throughout the pull-down menus. Usually I expect programmers who work with text string-matching to be attentive to details of natural language text.
I'm not seeing anything on zegup which allows you to even indicate from the list which domains you might be interested in. (Unlike LDS where you can go and register and click on something). Not that they won't add some way to mark a domain of course or allow you to register.
For speed purposes they should be FIRST running this check on yesterday's zone files from each registry (Verisign for .com/net for example). If that fails (shows in the zone file) no need to go further.
After that check if a name does show as available you do a whois against the appropriate registry NOT a REGISTRAR (because there is no reason to do that).
As step 1 if you don't have access to the zone file you can do a nslookup to see if the domain resolves. If it doesn't you can then check the registry (by the way PIR (.org) rate limits checks unless you are white listed).
Theoretically if a registrar has access to zegup they could front run domains IF the user of zegup indicated which domains they were interested in. Otherwise to many names to be of value in front running the way I see the site operating.
Of course there is nothing to prevent a registrar from putting up a man in the middle site (like zegup) hosted elsewhere and grabbing domains and doing what you are saying. So there is no way to "guarantee" what you are asking other than the reputation of the person running the "zegup" type site.
As an aside zegup.com was registered recently and has domain privacy. So even though whois can be faked privacy info when you are runnning a business is a bad idea.
Domain Name: ZEGUP.COM
Registrant: PrivacyProtect.org Domain Admin (contact@privacyprotect.org) ID#10760, PO Box 16 Note - All Postal Mails Rejected, visit Privacyprotect.org Nobby Beach null,QLD 4218 AU Tel. +45.36946676
Creation Date: 09-Feb-2012 Expiration Date: 09-Feb-2013
That was my first thought too. Any time I search for a domain name these days, my process goes something like:
1. Enter it into a web browser, see if it's in use or parked
2. If not, run whois on it at the commandline.
3. If not, decide whether I want to buy it. If so, do so right away, otherwise assume it will be lost in a day or so.
And I'm not even 100% sure I can trust the browser search, depending on what the DNS server I happen to be on does with failed lookups.
I personally don't feel that this is a reason for concern (very very small chance but yes it is possible). But there is a faster way anyway, cutting out web server not responding etc.
So in any case if you wanted to lessen that chance you could query any public nameserver, assuming you can trust that nameserver.
In a command window, using nslookup as an example, the process would be (using google public dns server but you can use anything that's the point):
nslookup
> server 8.8.8.8
Default server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
> skymarshal.com
Server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
Non-authoritative answer:
Name: skymarshal.com
Address: 208.91.197.26 (comment: name taken!)
> skymarshalxyz.com
Server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
server can't find skymarshalxyz.com: NXDOMAIN
> www.skymarkshalxyz.com (I made this up)
Server: 8.8.8.8
Address: 8.8.8.8#53
server can't find www.skymarkshalxyz.com: NXDOMAIN
> exit
"can't find" - name might be available - we have determined it's not resolving. Could be a dns issue of course but it's a good first step.
Doing with a browser can give you MORE of a false positive. DNS could respond with an address but the site could be down. Of course getting no response to DNS doesn't ALWAYS mean the domain is available but it's generally fairly accurate. At that point you would do a whois to confirm.
You can write a shell script of course to automate this from the command line.
You can safely use http://instantdomainsearch.com. It was written by a YC alum. Lots of companies we've funded have found names there.
That appears to be using nslookup (edit-"esq") to see if the domain resolves as a result of a test that I just ran. (Tried a name not in the zone file that IS taken (4L .com) - edit: it said it was available. Then tried a name that wasn't in the zone file and it took some time to determine if it was available. If it was comparing to the zone file there would be essentially no delay it would be a simple search. If I wanted to prove this I could register a name NOW, do the dns, and then do a query but I don't have time to do that. The zone file is only available once per day for download.
Also, it doesn't work for anything other than .com.
And if you hit "search" it sends you to godaddy.
All in all I think it makes more sense to simply find a dns server that you can trust OR get a hold of the zone file and query that (safest way actually). My personal feeling though is that this is all a non-issue.
May I suggest they change the default registrar from GoDaddy to something else?