Checking you've not lost any domains

[Toonz]

Hi

I have a question for those of you who manage dozens of domains.

When you've paid your registrar to renew a domain, do any of you check that it has actually been renewed?

Obviously with the individual buying and selling business - 'domaining' - I imagine you'd check every aspect of the transaction closely. But I'm talking about the routine renewing of domains with your registrar.

After a 123-reg cock-up a few years ago in which they lost one of my .coms and shifted responsibility onto me for their failure (long story), I'm just wondering how you minimise the risk of this happening (beyond never using 123-reg, I mean). Should we be checking that the registrars have done their job, and if so, what exactly do you do?

Cheers

Toonz

 

[Skinner]

123-reg are lying inept chimps, when dealing with .UK, most of us became nominet registrars so we are out the registrar. With .com you can use a enom reseller and the likes to be sort of your own registry.

 

[monaghan]

As he said! I may be a control freak, but I like to know that I am in command of my domains whether my own or my customer's

 

[Toonz]

Thanks for your replies. Yes, becoming a reseller/registrar would solve it I guess, assuming there isn't another 'layer' on top of them who could themselves fail.

Unfortunately I have fewer than half the number of domains needed to break even when taking into account costs for Nominet/enom, and as a web designer it's only a very small part of my job which I'm not really looking to expand. I suppose ideally I'd either focus on growing the domain service in order to become a reseller, or discontinue it altogether. But some clients prefer that I manage their domain renewals for them.

So I guess there's no tool or website out there to quickly and easily check renewals have actually occurred? Something I could do once a month, say?

 

[gimpydog]

do any of you check that it has actually been renewed?

Having had bad experiences with Registerfly, 1&1 and Domain Monster, I find it best to double-check everything they do.

 

[spiderspider]

So I guess there's no tool or website

watchmy.domains is the best I've found

 

[Toonz]

watchmy.domains is the best I've found

Thanks, that looks like it could be exactly what I was looking for!

 

[ImageAuthors]

So I guess there's no tool or website out there to quickly and easily check renewals have actually occurred? Something I could do once a month, say?

Some people use software called WatchMyDomains, which tracks expiration dates, etc. You might try that. Don't know if it handles .CO.UK or not. Maybe.

Personally I don't use WatchMyDomains much. But I know some high profile domain bloggers who rely on it. In my case, I built my own system years ago and regularly audit my accounts at various registrars.

When WatchMyDomains released a Mac version, I did give it a try. Liked the functionality, but I experienced some bugs in the first iteration for Mac. By now, those may have been resolved; or maybe I was the only person experiencing problems. Mac was a later addition, though. Their non-Mac releases are almost certainly bug-free.

If you're not using a Mac and if WatchMyDomains tracks .UK, then it's probably exactly what you're looking for.

 

[Bailey]

Pretty much as a golden rule I keep track of the two total number of domains in my two Accounts (Obviously not a great check if your moving in and out all the time) But whenever you access your Account those two figures sit at the top of the summary. The comment about 123-reg's management Systems is correct - bit like their Help-Desk - It's a shambles. Fortunately, Nominet will always push a scheduled drop 'out a week' as happened with one of my own .UK's after another 123-reg Cock-up (not much help if a domains Site goes down - due to a balls-up I'll admit)

 

[Skinner]

I use DNA Pro which I believe is by half of the same people who do WMD, or in some way connected, they changed names and seemed to split directions (I think) from Domain Punch to something else way back. But DNA pro I used to track drop lists, year on year drops (second shot at the name), deletions etc, use it for all sorts.

Database gets a little unruly at 100,000+ even on a computer with grunt than a hog farm

 

[Skinner]

A simple spreadsheet would require lots of manual work, copying and pasting, and updating.

A very simple php app could be made which pulled the expiry, updated a database, done daily for names within 30 days by Cron and then fires emails out as needed. But would require some work for each registry. I keep saying I'll do this, but my current setup works so its low on the list.

DNA Pro, you add names to it, it does a whois look up, and takes a snap shot and stores it. You can update single, or batches via right click, sort via exp, reg, or any other stored value.

A dozen ways to do it, but down to time and effort

 

[Toonz]

Some people use software called WatchMyDomains, which tracks expiration dates, etc. You might try that. Don't know if it handles .CO.UK or not. Maybe.

Personally I don't use WatchMyDomains much. But I know some high profile domain bloggers who rely on it. In my case, I built my own system years ago and regularly audit my accounts at various registrars.

When WatchMyDomains released a Mac version, I did give it a try. Liked the functionality, but I experienced some bugs in the first iteration for Mac. By now, those may have been resolved; or maybe I was the only person experiencing problems. Mac was a later addition, though. Their non-Mac releases are almost certainly bug-free.

If you're not using a Mac and if WatchMyDomains tracks .UK, then it's probably exactly what you're looking for.

Yep I use a Mac but I'll take a look at it, thanks.

I'm not too bothered about .UK as Nominet start to send their reminder emails once a domain has passed its expiry date, so in the event that a registrar's renewal didn't go through, I'd soon know about it.

 

[Toonz]

Thanks for all your suggestions. As I say, the issue isn't about remembering to renew, it's about me having to check each domain - after I've paid for the renewal - that the registrar has actually done what I've paid them to do. Yes I do actually have a spreadsheet (I have dozens but not hundreds of domains) and it's not too bad keeping it up to date.

 

[danielcoates]

I only really use the Nominet site to monitor my domains, both those on my TAG and those with other TAG's. It's a terrible system but that could be more to do with the fact that I'm rarely check or update them.

Some people use software called WatchMyDomains, which tracks expiration dates, etc. You might try that. Don't know if it handles .CO.UK or not. Maybe.

I have used this in the past, it's a really good piece of software, it's just overly featured for what I need.

A very simple php app could be made which pulled the expiry, updated a database, done daily for names within 30 days by Cron and then fires emails out as needed. But would require some work for each registry. I keep saying I'll do this, but my current setup works so its low on the list.

This is what I am currently working on, It's a good idea. If you use Composer, then this task get's a lot simpler with things like the EZSql library.

 

[Skinner]

I've never used composer or that sort of thing, my love is for Zend Studio but can't justify its costs, so use my stone age Dreamweaver.

The actual code to connect to whois servers and query, and parse, is about 70 lines of code, the database and and update (no database admin panel), and email code, you could probably do it in about 250 lines, wouldn't be pretty, wouldn't be fit for public release, but would do the job.

I've probably got all the bits, I'd just need to frankenstein it.

If you're doing it, when it comes to .com, you'll likely need to do 2 queries, first one to find its parent whois server and the second to query the parent whois.

Uniregistry have has a stupid quirk in their exipry date where it shows like dd-mm-yyy-t and and the dash in the 9th place throws strtotime() off.

There are also some variences between expiration date/expiry date and such like, so you need get jiggy with a little regex.

Aside form little quirks like that, its not too hard

This is what I am currently working on, It's a good idea. If you use Composer, then this task get's a lot simpler with things like the EZSql library.

 

[danielcoates]

I've never used composer or that sort of thing, my love is for Zend Studio but can't justify its costs, so use my stone age Dreamweaver.

lol, Dreamweaver, I haven't used that in years, I now use an open source text editor called Atom, you should check it out

The actual code to connect to whois servers and query, and parse, is about 70 lines of code, the database and and update (no database admin panel), and email code, you could probably do it in about 250 lines, wouldn't be pretty, wouldn't be fit for public release, but would do the job.

This may be true, but why re-invent things that have already been done, Composer is a framework that is used to manage open source code libraries, and make light work of using them with 'autoload' and namespaces.

Using the Phois/Whois library means that I don't have to bother with coding for different .com whois servers, it's been done in the past

The same thing goes for EPP using sclinternet/scl-nominet-epp and databases with jv2222/ezsql

There are also some variances between expiration date/expiry date and such like, so you need get jiggy with a little regex.

Regex is the DEVIL!!! But also extremely useful

 

[Skinner]

Dreamweaver is an old habit with loads of projects already set up, but I'll check out Atom, never got into notepad++ but always try new ones.

Sounds like you'll end up with many thousands of lines of redundant code. Just looking at the code files I think would need and done manually would be about 10kb and a few hundred lines. Even with EPP adding just the bits required would be 150ish lines.

The only thing my tiny lil app won't have is a pretty face, I assume composer it's a pretty face on ?

 

[danielcoates]

Dreamweaver is an old habit with loads of projects already set up, but I'll check out Atom, never got into notepad++ but always try new ones.

I hated Notepad++, and I learnt to code in 'notepad.exe', so even that is an improvement, the great thing about Atom is that it's supported by tons of extensions

Sounds like you'll end up with many thousands of lines of redundant code. Just looking at the code files I think would need and done manually would be about 10kb and a few hundred lines. Even with EPP adding just the bits required would be 150ish lines.

For something as simple as just checking a list of domains, your probably right, it's overkill. NameChase will be more than that, it's going to manage the whole thing, drop lists, keyword lists, tag management and more I have yet to think about. In the long run, I would rather have the simplicity of using open source packages, and concentrate on the specifics of the app then worry about things like a database class.

The only thing my tiny lil app won't have is a pretty face, I assume composer it's a pretty face on ?

Composer, is a back-end system, and is nothing more than a package manager, it's used to manage packages and dependencies, it has no face, certainly not a pretty one

 

[Skinner]

Oh right, I were thinking composer were like the old VB Rad which operated inside atom. I'm mobile at the moment so haven't looked into it.

I learned in notepad too.

I've already built most of those bits, not done keywords as moz/majestic is costly for my own use.

Rob (domainview) just added tag control panel tools and some other stuff. Pretty sure money is in catching and metrics.

How far through are you ?

 

[danielcoates]

I've already built most of those bits, not done keywords as moz/majestic is costly for my own use.

Yeah, I have bit's of code that I used to use for simple tasks like that, but for project like this I find it easier to use pre built packages.

Yup, Moz/Majestic are really expensive, I was more talking about custom keyword lists, for filtering domains based on topics, domain metrics is something that's on the future features list

Rob (domainview) just added tag control panel tools and some other stuff. Pretty sure money is in catching and metrics.

I don't have access to Rob's EPP system, tho I do use his catching service, and drop lists, I plan on creating a way to use his XML feeds, so I can browse both alongside my own lists.

I can't even afford Nominet Membership, £600 is a lot of money for me, and I rely on people like Rob to catch for me

The current thoughts on the project are just for personal use anyway, but there is a view to look at releasing it in the future, either open source, or monetised I haven't decided.

How far through are you ?

I'm just in the beginning stages, I've finished the initial database design, tho that could change, and I've started to code some of the back end classes, and the crawler, I've not even looked at front-end design.

It's been an on/off project for the last 4-5 months, with most of the work happening in the last few weeks, so it's really early days, I work 50+ hours a week at my regular night job, so 'free time' can sometimes be an issue

I learnt PHP 10+ years ago, and never kept up-to date so it's also a bit learning curve