How does one go about getting the global tld list of ALL domain names registered under the dot com space? I see site offering up recently deleted domains and things of that sort. I'm guessing the only way they are able to do that is by obtaining the entire list of domain names and then searching for the expiration date.

There was a thread about this in March or April -- try to search for it.

Basically you go to a page on Verisign's site and sign up for an FTP account. They then fax or snail mail you your FTP info and you log on and download the file(s) you want. The actual file is about six gigs. I haven't downloaded the entire file yet, but I got access a while back. It was for a project that I have on the back burner right now.

If you can't find the thread, I'll poke around and see if I can dig up the page you need.

It's here.
http://www.verisign-grs.com./tld/

The TLD Zone files only contain domain name and nameserver information. They do not contain any other domain information like expiration date.

-t

Don't quote me on this but off the top of my head these are the file sizes:
ORG: 45 megs zip (400 megs unzipped)
NET: 68 megs zip (700 megs unzipped)
COM: 330 megs zip (2.3 gigs unzipped)

And those are zipped, however, Verisign does upload it to you VERY fast.

The COM Zone file was 6Gig unzipped in April.

-t

Originally posted by thewitt
The TLD Zone files only contain domain name and nameserver information. They do not contain any other domain information like expiration date.

-t

How are sites like expirefish or snapnames able to give out recently expired domains then? Are they just downloading the tld files every night and comparing them for changes?

That is exactly how they do it.

A simpleton such as myself might create a simple database in oracle with a table that has domain_name and last_update as fields. Then load the zone file into the table, inserting new records and updating the last_update field for existing records. Then select everything where last_update < today and bingo, you have your deleted domains.

TheWitt,
the COM file is NOT 6 gigs unzipped, I downloaded it 3 days ago on Sunday, it was not over 3 gigs.

Originally posted by flitcher
TheWitt,
the COM file is NOT 6 gigs unzipped, I downloaded it 3 days ago on Sunday, it was not over 3 gigs.
Thanks. I have not pulled it down since late April. The uncompressed file on my system from April 20th is almost exactly 6G. I'll have to pull down the latest and see what's been dumped. I know they have been deleting undelegated nameservers and other "problems" with the data, but I'd find it hard to believe that half the data was junk in April...

-t

Yes,
Thats true, beginning in June they will replace IN NS with NS and IN A with A and delete orphan A Records. And like you said those alone cant cut the file size down in half, so download the COM file again and unzip it, tell me what size you get because you shouldn't get 6 gigs.

Hmm. Perhaps gzip was misbehaving.

I still had a copy of the uncompressed file from April 20th on disk, and it uncompressed to 2.4gig. The file diffs with no differences aginst the file that uncompressed to 5.8gig - same file contents, different file sizes.

I've asked my sysadmin to look into this.

-t

Hi,
I don't know why its doing that to you, look at the files size on Verisign's FTP, you'll see its in the 300 meg size range.

I've sent in a fax last week but haven't heard back from Netsol at all. Do they move slow or should I try again?

They move slowly, and you should ping them often...

-t

Hi, does anybody knows where are those files nowadays?

Thanks a lot!

Your resurrection of a three year old thread has prompted me to return from a one year absence.

The url is: TLD Zone Access Program (http://www.verisign.com/products-services/naming-and-directory-services/naming-services/com-net-registry/page_001052.html).