SRS Implementation Newsletter 31/05/02

Shared Registry System
.nz Provider Update May 2002

As expected, implementation activity increased significantly over the past month. The organisational change required to implement the SRS was given impetus when Debbie Monahan took up her position as Domain Name Commissioner on May 13 and the project to develop the SRS software gathered pace. The implementation remains on schedule.

Domain Name Commissioner

Debbie has been familiarising herself with the SRS and everything it involves. She is planning to undertake a roadshow for providers in early July, in conjunction with the registry and Domainz. By this time, she expects that all relevant information will be available to enable parties to make decisions about whether to seek authorisation as a registrar under the SRS, including the implementation timetable.

Debbie has also been doing a lot of preliminary work regarding the migration and allocation of domain names to the SRS and is currently reviewing this work from a legal perspective. She will make information on this publicly available as soon as it is practicable. While recognising that it is frustrating for some providers to not have definite information available at this stage, it is important that all issues are considered before the processes are finalised. Debbie looks forward to achieving a competitive, functional, and transparent environment and will work closely with providers, and others, to ensure this goal is met.

New Zealand Domain Name Registry Limited

The five directors of the SRS registry company were appointed during the month and have held their first board meeting. Carol Stigley was appointed as the Chair and the other directors are Anne Urlwin, Merv Delaney, David Farrar and David Zanetti. The board has been extremely active in attending to a range of establishment tasks, including the recruitment of the registry manager, administrative staffing, procuring premises, etc.

.nz Oversight Committee

The .nz Oversight Committee will generally discharge the InternetNZ Council’s governance responsibilities in the effective stewardship of the .nz domain name space. In particular, it will be responsible for

• the general operation of the .nz domain name space and the contracts that underpin it;
• the authorisation of registrars;
• the development and implementation of .nz policies; and
• international issues and developments as they affect the .nz domain name space.

Eleven nominations for membership were received following a request to InternetNZ members in early May. Interviews were held on May 24 and the InternetNZ Council will be receiving recommendations from the interviewing committee at their June 7 meeting.

Technical Implementation

The SRS prototyping exercise was completed during the month and it confirmed that the proposed architecture was effective, efficient, and could meet the required performance criteria. As a result, the technical architecture document was completed, signed-off, and published on the InternetNZ web site. The prototype findings were documented and published on the web site.

The detailed analysis work was also completed during the month. The resultant document describes every transaction that will be provided to SRS users to interact with the system, and the business rules associated with them. When combined with the technical architecture document, interested parties will have sufficient information to fully assess the functionality of the SRS and the technical implications of becoming a registrar. It is intended to publish the document on the InternetNZ web site following approval of the requirements by the InternetNZ Council. It is hoped they will be available in the week beginning June 10.

Work has begun on developing the Registrar Implementation Kit (RIK), which will be made available on CD and publicly on the web. Stage One of the kit will be distributed to the Registrar Working Group by the end of June, for evaluation and testing. The final kit will contain:

• purpose-built technical specifications enabling registrars to develop and implement their interface to the SRS;
• a full set of Open Source software that registrars can choose to employ, either entirely or partially, as an interface to the SRS;

• a fully-operable HTML client system that registrars can bolt on to the SRS interface; and

• a range of publicly available documents relevant to the SRS.

Work has also begun on the full application development phase. This involves enhancing the work already done for the prototype, making it 'industrial strength', incorporating the business rules defined by the detailed analysis, and developing those areas of the system that were not covered by the prototype. Certain key transactions have been targeted for completion by the end of June, in time for the Registrar Working Group to begin testing, although the full application will not be completed by then.

Any Comments?

If you have any questions or concerns about the SRS implementation, please don't hesitate to contact us. For technical matters, contact Doug Mercer (doug@internetnz.net.nz). For all other matters, contact Debbie Monahan (dnc@dnc.org.nz).

SRS Implementation Team
May 31 2002

Please note:

We have targeted this update at all currently accredited providers for .nz domain names, and other providers who are listed in the current register who are managing fifty or more domain names on behalf of name holders. If you know of someone else who would like to receive a copy of this update, please feel free to pass it onto them or have them e-mail office@internetnz.net.nz to be added to the mailing list for the next update.

References to all publicly available documents concerning the SRS can be found on the following web page

©2002 The Internet Society of New Zealand
Last updated 3 June 2002