Hi Ronald Just to clarify what we mean by notifications.
'individual notification in advance' - means sending an email to the contacts of the MNTNER objects of all the objects to be updated by the cosmetic change before the change takes place 'update notifications' - these are the notification emails sent out by the update software, when a change takes place, to the "notify:" and "mnt-nfy:" attribute email addresses cheers denis co-chair DB-WG On Mon, 6 Sept 2021 at 22:42, Ronald F. Guilmette via db-wg <[email protected]> wrote: > > In message > <cakvlzueof2ttkeqgfexwt6gdv2s2autbbzuubn4idanxyec...@mail.gmail.com> > denis walker <[email protected]> wrote: > > >There have been a number of cosmetic changes to the RIPE Database in > >recent months. There is no agreed procedure for making these type of > >changes. In particular the extent to which the community is informed. > >Examples of the type of changes we are talking about are: > >1/ When the ORGANISATION object addresses were synced with the > >internal registry the address lines were entered in the wrong order. > >The RIPE NCC did a cosmetic update to reverse the order of the address > >lines. It had no operational impact at all. > >2/ Capitalisation of status values. Again this had no operational impact at > >all. > > I am in agreement 100% that these all constitute "cosmetic" changes. > > In fact, this gives me an excuse to bring up another such "cosmetic" change > that I proposed some time back and that was met with stony silence from > everyone here, to wit: > > All case-insensitive handles appearing in the data base should be forced > to all upper case. > > I seem to recall that at some point in time, on this list, at least one > person did suggest that perhaps it would be Nice if such "cosmetic" aspects > of the data base were done in a manner that would simplify parsing of > data base elements. Speaking as one who routinely is engaged in the > parsing of data base elements I vigorously agree with that sentiment. > The current status quo in which case-insensitive handles appear in the > data base with all sort of bizzare semi-capitalizations serves no purpose > other than to confuse all users into the mistaken belief that case has > some actual and practical significance when it comes to handles, when in > fact it does not. Furthermore it is unambiguously the case that the lack > of consistant capitalization of handles in the data base needlessly > complicates parsing and any kind of automated analysis. What is the > practical usefulness of this "cosmetic" foolishness? If there is none, > then can we please get rid of it? It generates needless additional > complaxity for *zero* practical gain. > > >We would like some feedback from the community about how you want > >these type of cosmetic changes announced. We see four possible > >options: > > > >1/ individual notification in advance to all affected maintainers plus > >general announcement on the mailing list plus update notifications > >(full disclosure) > >2/ general announcement on the mailing list plus update notifications > >3/ general announcement on mailing list and silent update (no notifications) > >4/ no announcement, no notifications, just do it without disturbing > >anyone (totally silent) > > It is not clear from the foregoing what you mean by "notifications" as > contrasted with "individual notifications". Can you please elaborate > denis? > > In any event, my personal answer to your question is that there exists > both a DB WG working group mailing list and also a member's announcements > mailing list, and if members want to keep abreast of such events and > changes, they should be subscribed to one or the other of those lists, > and thus, it should be sufficient just to make the cosmetic change after > pre-announcing it on these mailing lists. I certainly don't see why > any individualized member notifications would be either helpful or > necessary. > > > Regards, > rfg >
