AltDB?

Wed Jan 5 17:07:44 UTC 2011

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 11:26 AM, Jon Lewis <jlewis at lewis.org> wrote:
>> Anyone here use AltDB? It seems their servers have been down for two days.
> Can anyone from Level3 say how this will impact customer BGP filters. Will
> L3 keep working with the last data sync they got from altdb?  I'm guessing

Since Level3 updates their prefix-lists at least daily, and integrates
new ALTDB updates at least daily, and the ALTDB has been down for over
a day, obviously it will not affect your Level3 prefix-lists in the
near-term.  If Level3 decided to stop honoring ALTDB objects, say,
because ALTDB was never fixed, I imagine you would find it necessary
to re-publish your objects or Level3 would stop honoring your routes.

> I'd been thinking about moving from altdb to ARIN's but hadn't had
> sufficient motivation.

I emailed ARIN yesterday to ask if their IRR database has any
authentication support (other than mail-from) yet.  I haven't seen any
reply from ARIN yet, but my guess is they still have no useful
authentication mechanism.  I would rather depend on an IRR database
that can't process updates for a few days per year, than use one where
a malicious party could alter or erase all of my objects at any time.
I would like to note that RADB had route6: support in about 2004 or
so, if my memory serves me; while the ARIN database did not accept
route6 objects until about a year ago.  So it is not exactly a high
priority for ARIN.

Note also that Level3 has an IRR database, so you could use theirs if
you want to.  I don't prefer to use a transit provider database if I
can use a "neutral" one, but sometimes I would rather not pay the
(entirely reasonable) fee for the MERIT RADB.

-- 
Jeff S Wheeler <jsw at inconcepts.biz>
Sr Network Operator  /  Innovative Network Concepts