==> From: Suwat Panitkullawat <suwat@rs.thnic.net> ==> Wed, 15 Jan 1997 21:43:39 +0700 (GMT+7:00)

From instruction in RIPE's configuration file. There is a suggestion that we should not use NIC handle's postfix differrent from the source name.

Can someone explain me why? Are there any serious errors if I do so.

Depends on your definition of "serious" :-) If you set up your own database, with source "SUWAT" for example, but you choose to keep the "RIPE" postfix for NIC handles, you might be able to register a record for yourself, with handle "SP-RIPE". However, there is already an "SP-RIPE" in the RIPE database, causing some confusion. The idea of a NIC handle is to have a unique key pointing to a person. Using the "source:" as the postfix helps you identify in which database the handle is registered and avoids conflicting registrations for the same key. To be fair it's also a bit of a kludge, but probably the only thing that will work until we have a truly global IRR. And may facilitate merging existing operational databases once a global IRR is there, avoiding NIC handle clashes across databases. Of course, the postfix trick only works as long as the "source:"'s are allocated in a unique way. Hope this helps, Steven