whois.md(1)

1WHOIS(1)                       Debian GNU/Linux                       WHOIS(1)
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NAME

6       whois - client for the whois directory service
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SYNOPSIS

9       whois  [  {  -h | --host } HOST ] [ { -p | --port } PORT ] [ -abBcdGHK‐
10       lLmMrRx  ]  [  -g   SOURCE:FIRST-LAST   ]   [   -i   ATTR[,ATTR]...   ]
11       [ -s SOURCE[,SOURCE]... ] [ -T TYPE[,TYPE]... ] [ --verbose ] OBJECT
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13       whois -q KEYWORD
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15       whois -t TYPE
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17       whois -v TYPE
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19       whois --help
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21       whois --version
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DESCRIPTION

25       whois searches for an object in a RFC 3912 database.
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27       This version of the whois client tries to guess the right server to ask
28       for the specified object. If no guess can be made it  will  connect  to
29       whois.networksolutions.com  for  NIC handles or whois.arin.net for IPv4
30       addresses and network names.
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OPTIONS

33       -h HOST, --host HOST
34               Connect to HOST.
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36       -H      Do not display the legal disclaimers some  registries  like  to
37               show you.
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39       -p, --port PORT
40               Connect to PORT.
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42       --verbose
43               Be verbose.
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45       --help  Display online help.
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47       --version
48               Display client version information.
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50       Other  options  are  flags  understood by whois.ripe.net and some other
51       RIPE-like servers:
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53       -a      Also search all the mirrored databases.
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55       -b      Return brief IP address ranges with abuse contact.
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57       -B      Disable object filtering. (Show the e-mail addresses.)
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59       -c      Return the smallest IP address range with a reference to an irt
60               object.
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62       -d      Return the reverse DNS delegation object too.
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64       -g SOURCE:FIRST-LAST
65               Search  updates  from  SOURCE  database  between FIRST and LAST
66               update serial number. It's useful to obtain Near Real Time Mir‐
67               roring stream.
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69       -G      Disable grouping of associated objects.
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71       -i ATTR[,ATTR]...
72               Search  objects having associated attributes. ATTR is attribute
73               name.  Attribute value is positional OBJECT argument.
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75       -K      Return  primary  key  attributes  only.  Exception  is  members
76               attribute  of  set  object  which  is  always returned. Another
77               exceptions are all attributes of objects organisation,  person,
78               and role that are never returned.
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80       -l      Return the one level less specific object.
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82       -L      Return all levels of less specific objects.
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84       -m      Return all one level more specific objects.
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86       -M      Return all levels of more specific objects.
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88       -q KEYWORD
89               Return  list  of  keywords  supported by server. KEYWORD can be
90               version for server version, sources for list  of  source  data‐
91               bases, or types for object types.
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93       -r      Disable recursive look-up for contact information.
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95       -R      Disable  following  referrals and force showing the object from
96               the local copy in the server.
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98       -s SOURCE[,SOURCE]...
99               Request the server to search for objects mirrored from SOURCES.
100               Sources  are  delimited  by comma and the order is significant.
101               Use -q sources option to obtain list of valid sources.
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103       -t TYPE Return the template for a object of TYPE.
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105       -T TYPE[,TYPE]...
106               Restrict the search to objects of TYPE. Multiple types are sep‐
107               arated by a comma.
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109       -v TYPE Return the verbose template for a object of TYPE.
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111       -x      Search for only exact match on network address prefix.
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NOTES

114       Please  remember  that  whois.networksolutions.com by default will only
115       search in the domains database. If you want to search for  NIC  handles
116       you have to prepend a ! character. When you do this, the default server
117       becomes whois.networksolutions.com.
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119       When querying whois.arin.net for IPv4 or IPv6 networks, the  CIDR  net‐
120       mask length will be automatically removed from the query string.
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122       When querying whois.nic.ad.jp for AS numbers, the program will automat‐
123       ically convert the request in the appropriate format, inserting a space
124       after the string AS.
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126       When  querying  whois.denic.de for domain names and no other flags have
127       been specified, the program will automatically add the flag -T dn.
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129       When querying whois.dk-hostmaster.dk for  domain  names  and  no  other
130       flags  have been specified, the program will automatically add the flag
131       --show-handles.
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133       RIPE-specific command line options are ignored when  querying  non-RIPE
134       servers.  This  may  or  may not be the behaviour intended by the user.
135       When querying a non-standard server, command line options which are not
136       to  be  interpreted by the client should always follow the -- separator
137       (which marks the beginning of the query string).
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139       If the /etc/whois.conf configuration file exists, it will be  consulted
140       to  find  a  server  before applying the normal rules. Each line of the
141       file should contain a regular expression  to  be  matched  against  the
142       query  text and the whois server to use, separated by white space.  IDN
143       domains must use the ACE format.
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145       The whois protocol does not specify an encoding  for  characters  which
146       cannot be represented by ASCII and implementations vary wildly.  If the
147       program knows that a specific server uses a certain encoding, if needed
148       it  will  transcode  the server output to the encoding specified by the
149       current system locale.
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151       Command line arguments will always be interpreted  accordingly  to  the
152       current  system locale and converted to the IDN ASCII Compatible Encod‐
153       ing.
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FILES

156       /etc/whois.conf
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ENVIRONMENT

159       LANG   When querying whois.nic.ad.jp and whois.jprs.jp English text  is
160              requested  unless  the LANG or LC_MESSAGES environment variables
161              specify a Japanese locale.
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163       WHOIS_OPTIONS
164              A list of options which will be evaluated before the ones speci‐
165              fied on the command line.
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167       WHOIS_SERVER
168              This  server  will  be queried if the program cannot guess where
169              some kind of objects are located. If the variable does not exist
170              then whois.arin.net will be queried.
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BUGS

181       The program may have buffer overflows in the command  line  parser:  be
182       sure to not pass untrusted data to it.  It should be rewritten to use a
183       dynamics strings library.
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HISTORY

186       This program closely tracks the user  interface  of  the  whois  client
187       developed at RIPE by Ambrose Magee and others on the base of the origi‐
188       nal BSD client.  I also  added  support  for  the  protocol  extensions
189       developed by David Kessens of QWest for the 6bone server.
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AUTHOR

192       Whois  and this man page were written by Marco d'Itri <md@linux.it> and
193       are licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License, version
194       2 or higher.
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199Marco d'Itri                   20 December 2009                       WHOIS(1)