Proposal for Periodic Clean-up for the TEST RIPE Database Motivation ---------- The RIPE NCC provides a TEST RIPE Database for users to learn how to use the software and try out new updates without the risk of damaging data in the real database. This database uses the same software as the production version of the RIPE Database. The data in the TEST database is NOT a copy of that in the RIPE Database, it is not authoritative data. Therefore no value should be put on it. The RIPE NCC only carries out maintenance operations in the RIPE Database and not in the TEST database. Over time, however, outdated features in the database software may make some parts of the TEST database unusable. To ensure a clean functioning test environment, we propose a periodic clean-up of the TEST database. Objectives ---------- - To increase the availability of the TEST database with a minimum of administrator interference. - To clean up unneeded items from the TEST database. - To provide a consistent starting point for the TEST database. Implementation -------------- - Every first Tuesday of each month, the TEST database will be reloaded with a set of database objects. Downtime will be brief, and is estimated to be at most half an hour. - After the reinitialisation, the database will contain: * One PERSON, one ROLE, one ORGANISATION and one MAINTAINER object for test purposes. * One MAINTAINER object to maintain the test MAINTAINER object. * 0/0 network ranges for IPv4 and IPv6. * 0/0 ROUTE and ROUT6 objects. * One as-block containing as0 - as65535. * Three DOMAIN objects for 'in-addr.arpa', 'ip6.arpa' and 'e164.arpa'. -- Can Bican Software Engineering Department