Volume 3. No 2 Information Technology News of the University of California, Davis Winter 1995

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New White Pages Available Online

by Dan Dorough, Distributed Computing Analysis and Support

Information Technology has established a new "whois" database for the Davis campus.

The "whois" database is an electronic "white pages" directory of faculty, staff and students at the university. Searchable by name or by "MailID", the "whois" database includes such optional information as department and title for staff and faculty, or college and major for students, as well as telephone numbers and electronic mail addresses. The "whois" service is a common feature on the worldwide Internet, allowing peers and colleagues to find each other electronically.

The previous "whois" database, in service since 1989, was built for a population of about 5,000 e-mail users, required manual entry and update of all information, and included many incorrect or out-of-date entries. The new database is highly automated, uses data sources from other databases, can handle at least 100,000 e-mail users, and allows faculty, staff and students to update their own entry online.

The new database already contains over 56,700 entries. More than 28,000 of those entries have registered MailID e-mail addresses.

The "whois" database can be accessed from any Information Resources login server with the "ucdwhois" command, or from any Unix system on the Internet with the "whois-h directory.ucdavis.edu" command. You may search the database using a last name, or a last and first name in the form "last, first". If you know an individual's MailID, you can search faster with the form !mailid". The "whois" server will return a brief help message if you search for the name "?".

The "whois" database can also be accessed via the CWIS (Gopher) and via the World Wide Web (Mosaic).

By default, faculty, staff, and students have a "whois" listing showing the standard information extracted from UCOP and BANNER databases, for example home department (for faculty and staff) or major college (for students). If you would like to override this information or add to it (with a U.S. mail address, for example), you can do so directly online, from any computer or terminal connected to the campus network.

To update the "whois" information, follow these steps:

1. Use the telnet command or menu option of your computer to access the host mothra.ucdavis.edu
2. At the login prompt, type the word services. You'll be placed in the "Mothra Services Menu".
3. Select the W menu option to override the "whois" information. From there, just follow the instructions.

Future enhancements are planned for the "whois" database, including an automatic linkage with the campus telephone directory, faster searching methods for name searches, and integration with the UC systemwide "whois" directory.