Archive for: September, 2008

Domain pricing promotions and changes on October 1, 2008

There are a few domains related items of interest that all happen on October 1st, 2008:

First up are the price increases for .COM and .NET domain names. Effective October 1st, 2008, the Registry price for .COM names goes up $0.44 to $6.86 and the Registry price for .NET domains goes up $0.38 to $4.98. As previously announced, our wholesale prices for .COM and .NET domains will rise by the same amounts effective October 1st.

Next, the .ME Registry will begin offering one-year terms on new registrations. Previously, new registrations had to be two years in duration. We’ll begin offering one-year terms as soon as the .ME Registry flips the switch on their end – that’s expected to happen just after midnight UTC time on October 1st, 2008.

Also of note are a couple of promotional deals that are either starting or coming to an end:

Beginning on October 1st, .ASIA domains will be available for $5/domain year for new registrations of 1-10 years. That promotion runs throughout the month of October.
Effective October 1st, .AT domains will be available for $10 for the first year only on new registrations only.
The .COM.MX promotion that was in effect comes to an end and .COM.MX pricing will return to normal effective October 1st.
And last, but not least, the .CN domain promotion has been extended once again and will continue throughout October.

Remember that we maintain an up to date webpage listing all of the current domain promotions for resellers.

Inside OpenSRS Video Series: Changes and Plans for OpenSRS

In this video, Ken talks about the changes and plans for OpenSRS and some of the product launches and enhancements we’ve made over the past year. He explains some of the changes that are not as visible such as making our services even more reliable, scalable, and the preparatory work being done for future software development. Ken says that since we have become an Agile shop, we’ve been able to do quick iterations and roll out features and enhancements much faster than ever before.

Ken also shares some of the reason why we decided to reclaim OpenSRS as the name for our wholesale services. Ken explains that “reseller friendly” is not just a tag line; It is a value we have believed in for a long time.

What’s your opinion on some of the changes we have made recently? What would you like us to do more, do less, do differently? Also, what projects or products have you launched recently, or are thinking about doing in the future?

Stay tuned for two more videos that complete our series of six videos called Inside OpenSRS.

Some customer feedback on the OpenSRS API

At OpenSRS, we’re always happy to get feedback from our resellers. Our technical delivery teams work hard to make sure we have some of the most reliable and advanced technology available to our resellers. Our OpenSRS API is no exception. This week, Chris, a developer with one of our domains resellers, wrote to us with this feedback about our API:

“I can’t say enough good things about the OpenSRS API. It’s easy to understand, well laid out and gives examples! Our goal was to be able to do as much as we could via API. With the OpenSRS API “as much as we could” turned into everything. I honestly expected the tools development to take me past our go live date. I was wrong – our tools are ready now and we’re really looking forward to using them.

The major difference in the OpenSRS API is that it uses xml instead of a strict URL post. With a URL post, all the information must be in the URL and, as I’m sure you can imagine, those URLs can get very long. Another differentiator with the OpenSRS API is that entries don’t require complete information sets and most of the time entries can be done in one step. For example, when I’m writing a script to update a domain’s complete contact info, I only need to generate one xml file from the script and it’s done super fast. With other APIs, I have to have the script generate a long URL and connect with that long URL to update part of the info first, then I have to send another even longer URL to update the rest of the domain info. That method is much slower and takes forever.

I also like how the OpenSRS API is modular. Once I understood what was required of the xml and connection – which didn’t take long thanks to the documentation – I could simply copy/paste the heart of the script into the next script I was writing and only change a few values. Bam, another script was born!

One thing I really like about the OpenSRS system, not specific to the API, is the way you guys handle the security of the system. The use of an md5 key to encrypt the xml instead of just using the account login information is awesome and makes things really easy and very secure.

I have to say that there really isn’t much that you guys leave out of your API. With the tools I’ve written we won’t have to use the RWI at all because your API covers everything with the exception of maybe two things: we’d like to have the ability to add notes to a domain name. The get_notes feature is awesome and I’m sure we’ll be using this a great deal every day and if we could add our own notes that would only make it better. We’d also like to see the ability to run reports like domains transferred out, domains transferred in, renewals, etc. We can do this now via the RWI but we’d love the ability to do this via API.”

We’d love to hear your experiences with our API. Drop us a line in the comments and let us know how we’re doing.

Thanks to Flickr user kalledoo for the snazzy photo and for releasing it under Creative Commons so we could share it.

Inside OpenSRS Video Series: Network Operations at OpenSRS

Kevin Rueckert has a long history with OpenSRS. He’s worked here for almost a decade! And as you can see, he’s still passionate about his work. Kevin is our Manager of Network Operations Center (NOC). Kevin and his team monitor our systems 24-hours-a-day to ensure high availability and performance of our services to our resellers. In addition to monitoring, the NOC documents and trouble-shoots any issues, and escalates to other departments if needed. In this video, Kevin describes the major functions of the NOC, best practices used including an ITIL-compliant process, and what happens when issues are serious. His team is proactive by providing data trends and monitoring, and working with engineers and architects to roll fixes. The NOC is the technical information hub at OpenSRS.

We’d like to hear from any of our resellers about their technical and network operations. What are some of the things that keep you up at night? And what do you (and your teams) do to relax when the pressure is off?

This is part of a series of six videos called Inside OpenSRS that features some of the people who work to provide high-quality services for our resellers. Stay tuned as we share the other videos with you over the next few weeks.

Celebrate One Web Day

Today, all over the world, people are celebrating One Web Day, best described as an Earth Day for the Internet. The idea behind it is to focus attention on a key Internet value (this year, online participation in democracy), focus attention on local Internet concerns (connectivity, censorship, individual skills), and create a global constituency that cares about protecting and defending the Internet. So, think of One Web Day as an environmental movement for the Internet ecosystem. It’s a platform for people to educate and activate others about issues that are important for the Internet’s future.

We decided to join in and mark this important day, and have been posting content over on the Tucows corporate news site:

September 17: All About One Web Day

September 18: Making a Difference in Canada and Beyond

September 19: Video: Elliot Noss on the Power of the Internet

September 22: One Web Day: One Question

You can see what the rest of the world is doing to celebrate the event at the One Web Day site. Are you or your organization participating this year? Post a comment and let us know.

Archive for: September, 2008

Domain pricing promotions and changes on October 1, 2008

Inside OpenSRS Video Series: Changes and Plans for OpenSRS

Some customer feedback on the OpenSRS API

Inside OpenSRS Video Series: Network Operations at OpenSRS

Celebrate One Web Day

Become a Reseller

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