Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)

  
 
  

home | help
WHOB(8) 		     System Manager's Manual			 WHOB(8)

NAME
     whob -- display whois-type information of interest to Internet operators

SYNOPSIS
     whob [-h whois-server] [-g] [-AaCcfhNnOopRrstuVv] query

DESCRIPTION
     whob  queries  various sources of whois information for data of interest to
     network operators and their tracing and debugging tools.

     whob output is designed to be easily parsed, or better yet, its functional-
     ity can be added directly into your programs (see whois.h).

     The only mandatory parameter is the target host name or IP number.  Options
     toggle the display of more interesting data or change the sources	used  to
     obtain that data.

     One key advantage of whob is its lookup of ASN information derived from the
     global  Internet routing table itself, as opposed to relying solely on what
     has been registered in the RADB/IRR (see below).  This data is, by default,
     sourced from the global pWhoIs service.  See www.pwhois.org

     Other options are:

     -A ASN  Display all routing advertisements transiting the	respective  ASN.
	     The ASN may be supplied as the target argument, or a hostname or IP
	     address  may  be  supplied  and whob will resolve the ASN automati-
	     cally.

     -a ASN  Display all routing advertisements made by the  respective  Origin-
	     AS.   The	Origin-AS  may	be supplied as the target argument, or a
	     hostname or IP address may be supplied and whob  will  resolve  the
	     ASN automatically.

     -P prefix
	     Display  all routing advertisements related to the CIDR prefix sup-
	     plied by the user.

     -N ASN  Display all networks registered to the ASN supplied by the user.

     -O ASN  Display all contact information on file for the ASN supplied by the
	     user.

     -g      Disable GIGO mode.  By popular request, whob takes  input	directly
	     from  the command line and passes it without modification to pWhoIs
	     or whatever whois server is requested (-h).  The  exact  output  is
	     returned without any parsing.  To enable parsing and the other use-
	     ful switches, disable GIGO mode by passing this (-g) option.

     -R      Display  the  Origin-AS  on record at the RADB/IRR (Routing Arbiter
	     Database/Internet Routing Registry) in addition the  the  Origin-AS
	     provided by the prefix-based whois data source.

     -n      Display  the  network name on record with the IP network allocation
	     registry also such as ARIN, RIPE, or APNIC.

     -o      Display the organization name on file at the registrar.

     -p      Display the AS-Path from the  perspective	of  the  current  pwhois
	     server.   The  pwhois server may automatically exclude the initial,
	     least specific ASN received from the operator  of	the  network  to
	     which  it	is  connected (unless that ASN is the only/origin ASN or
	     unless it has multiple peers). Of course, this AS-Path  is  subjec-
	     tive.   If  you  rely  on this and want AS-Paths that correspond to
	     *your* network infrastructure, you may want  to  install  your  own
	     pwhois server.  See the (-w) option and www.pwhois.org

     -t      Display the date the route was last cached by the pWhoIs server.

     -u      When possible, display dates in UTC/GMT instead of local time.

     -h/w host
	     Change  the  source  of  prefix-based  whois  data from the default
	     (pWhoIs) to any whois-compatible server of your choice  (like  your
	     own).

     -f file
	     Read from the specified file (or from stdin if the argument is '-')
	     and submit its contents as bulk input to pwhois.  The input will be
	     buffered  accordingly and subject to the constraints of the current
	     pwhois server.  Output is written to STDOUT  (which  may  be  redi-
	     rected)  and will not be parsed.  Additional instructions to pwhois
	     may be placed at the beginning of the file, however they will  only
	     apply  to	the first buffer of pwhois input.  The first (left-most)
	     field in each line of the file must be the IP address and lines may
	     be up to 255 characters in length.

     -c      Change the source of  prefix-based  whois	data  from  the  default
	     (pWhoIs)  to Cymru.  See www.cymru.com for more details.  When used
	     with the -f option, this switch causes whob to use Cymru whois  for
	     bulk file resolution instead of pwhois.

     -r      Display  the  Origin-AS  and  prefix according to RIPE NCC RIS (see
	     www.ripe.net/projects/ris/).  When used with the  -f  option,  this
	     switch  causes  whob to use RIPE NCC riswhois for bulk file resolu-
	     tion instead of pwhois.

     -s      Show the status of the (respective) pWhoIs server and exit(0)

     -V      Display verbose/debug output.  Use  multiple  'V's  for  additional
	     verbosity.

     -v      Display this client's version information and exit(1)

     -me|whoami
	     Display this host's public IP address and exit(0)

AUTHORS
     Victor Oppleman and Eugene Antsilevitch

REPORTING BUGS
     To report bugs, send e-mail to <whob@oppleman.com>

SEE ALSO
     lft(8), whois(1)

HISTORY
     The  whob	command first appeared in 2004.  This whois framework has been a
     component of LFT since 2002.

WHOB				 August 17, 2002			 WHOB(8)

Want to link to this manual page? Use this URL:
<https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=whob&sektion=8&manpath=FreeBSD+Ports+15.1.quarterly>

home | help