Drop dates

[buttontop]

just a quick qustion on drop dates.
it says at the top of the page that todays drop dates are:
25-10-2009 & 01-11-2009

why is there two of them?
how do you work out the drop date?

 

[crabfoot]

You get two dates because the person giving the info has prepared it in advance of the drops - they can see them falling, they have the advance info.
Whatever, if a domain is officially dropping on a Monday, do not be surprised when it actually drops on the following Friday.

Nominet is a bit vague in actually applying the rules - sometimes everything gets fangled together when domains are dropping.

To work out a drop date, click on "Calculate UK Domain Drop Dates" in the top bar - it is so obvious, everybody misses it!

 

[Systreg]

@ Crabfoot, actually, they don't use 2 dates any more, they changed to a single drop date as of sometime last summer.

All domains drop on a single date which is the 92 day one, whereas before it might drop on 92 days or 99 days, depending on whether the domain had nameservers listed for it, something like that anyway, but they all drop on the latter 92 days now.

Edit

For example, a name with the renewal date of:

Renewal date: 02-Nov-2009

If it doesn't get renewed, that will drop today, February 2nd.

 

[foz]

Nominet standardised to 92 days (from the renewal date).

e.g. Renewal date 2nd Nov 2009 will drop 2nd Feb 2010 (if in suspended state).

Their are exceptions, but they are rare.

 

[buttontop]

ok so today is 19th feb and the drop dates that are listed at the top are

Today's drop dates are 12-11-2009 & 19-11-2009

now a domain i know "playfreeonlinegames.org.uk" is expiry date is 19.11.2009 and it hasnt dropped today so i guess it will be dropping in 7 days time right? ......is there any better way of knowing really when a domain will trully drop? as in what hour.....what part of the hour and things?

 

[Systreg]

@ Buttontop, not a single name dropped yesterday (19th) when that name was due to drop, must be having problems at Nom towers, so it'll probably drop today (20th) instead.

All drops are random, so there is no way to know what hour or part of an hour a name will drop.

 

[buttontop]

ok but is there a time between x and y they drop, is it on the hours or really totally random?

 

[foz]

ok but is there a time between x and y they drop, is it on the hours or really totally random?

As Systreg says - Random.

 

[Systreg]

No, any name can drop in any millisecond of any second of any hour.

[edit]

Just to add, as with there being no drops at all yesterday for whatever reason, I can't see that anything has dropped yet today either? If that's the case, it'll probably be the same tomorrow until Nominet do something on Monday to rectify any problem they are having.

 

[Edwin]

And if that happens, they may drop 4 days' worth on Monday, or they may reset the drops in some way depending on what the exact problem is. Hard to tell until they post a system update or release some kind of information.

 

[buttontop]

so how does having a connection 2ms from nom help? on a very basic level can someone explain how a drop catching script does its job?

everyone has the same basic starting point, they want domain xxx.co.uk. they have the same amount of quota for the day and having a faster connection to nom will only give you slight advantage, but only slight. so how can the same people keep winning dropped domains?

 

[foz]

so how can the same people keep winning dropped domains?

Expert programming skills and intelligence I would think.

 

[retired_member12]

As a 'typical' example, just how quick is the process from sending the enquiry to registering the name?

 

[Edwin]

Selectivity is part of it. If you're only going for 1 domain in a day, you can devote more resources to it than somebody who's e.g. going for 20 domains (all other things being equal, your chances should be 20x theirs)