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Development Roadmap
Introduction
We are continually making improvements and changes to our systems to add new features, functionality and improve usability. These system upgrades are generally released as part of our monthly systems release schedule. Alongside specific system changes we also have an ongoing programme of internal process and infrastructure development.
The table below shows items that are currently on the systems development roadmap. Our development programme is split into 3 main areas:
- In progress: refers to new services, features and enhancements we are currently developing and have scheduled for release. We work hard to meet published release dates and test all releases thoroughly, however, we occasionally have to change plans to allow for unforeseen circumstances, new requirements or bugs discovered during beta testing.
- In planning: These items are in the planning and specification stage, and are likely to be scheduled for release. Items in this category will move into the 'In progress' section when appropriate.
- Potential developments: These are projects or ideas for developments that are at a very early conceptual stage. Some may make it through to planning and development, however some may be unfeasible, cost prohibitive or not meet customer needs. Other projects may require policy changes or stakeholder consultation before they can be progressed.
Our development process is greatly enhanced when we receive feedback from customers. If there are any changes you would like us to make to our systems or processes, please let us know. The roadmap below outlines our plans for the coming months, while our Service Announcement RSS Feed will notify you of what to expect as we near each release along with the accompanying release notes.
| In progress | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Project title | Summary | Expected release date | |
| HTML email | We will be changing our announcement and information emails from plain text to HTML. Nom-announce and other communications will be sent as multipart email, enabling the recipient to choose how email is received based on their email client settings. We will provide an email preference option in Online Service for those registrars that only wish to receive plain text email. All of our system generated notifications (ie automaton responses and EPP notifications) will remain unchanged. The nom-tech mailing list will also remain in plain text. Switching to HTML email will enable us to use branded email templates, making our communications consistent and recognisable. We will also be able to measure the effectiveness of our communications, however we are still committed to keeping monitoring and tracking to a minimum. | TBC | |
| In planning | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Project title | Summary | Estimated release date | |
| Multi Year Registration periods | Currently .uk registrations and renewals are for a two year period. We are planning to introduce the ability to register or renew .uk domain names for different periods. For more information on multi-year registration periods click here. | May 2012 | |
| DNSSEC Signing Service | DNSSEC will be available to all registrars by placing the appropriate DS records into the .uk zone file and the domain names nameserver records. The implementation of DNSSEC by a registrar will require investment in resources (time, hardware and software) to provision their infrastructure to be able to generate and manage DNSSEC. Nominet will develop a simple DNSSEC signing service that, with a much lower infrastructure investment, will allow registrars to sign zones. Nominet will generate and manage DNSSEC keys and place them within the zone file and nameserver infrastructure, allowing registrars to sign zones in a quick and simple way. | TBC | |
| Registrant name requirements | We will apply the following logic to registration systems and the registrant transfer process: 1.The registrant name must contain 4 or more characters (any). 2. The registrant name must contain 3 or more letters (a-z). Any application where the registrant name does not meet the criteria would result in the application being rejected with an appropriate error message to the registrar. The registrar would then be required to resubmit the application. Any registrant transfer that does not meet the criteria would see an appropriate error message within the registrant transfer application. The registrant would then be required to amend the registrant name provided in order for the transfer to proceed. | Test bed March Release in April | |
| Trial data update window | Following results from an ongoing process of data validation, there will be a one month window to allow registrars to update the registrant name on any records that we have been unable to validate. In addition to the registrant address fields registrars will also be able to modify the registrant name field through all of our registration systems. Any changes will then be validated as part of the monthly validation schedule. This will allow us to assess the quality of the new registrant information provided by registrars during this "window". The aim of the trial is to provide registrars with the means to correct invalid registrant information that has failed our validation checks. The process may be repeated once the first round has been completed and the impact fully analysed. Registrars will be notified about unvalidated registrant data associated with domain names on their tags and will be provided with the means to download a list of domains from our registration systems. | Test bed April Release in May | |
| Automaton removal of deprecated fields | There are a number of fields in the automaton which have been deprecated for some time. We will be amending the fields so that going forward all automaton operations using these fields will be rejected. Please see Removal of deprecated fields for more details on the fields and the action that registrars using these fields need to take. | 12th April | |
| Potential developments | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Project title | Summary | Status | |
| IDN | Investigate market requirements and technical requirements to implement Internationalised Domain Names in the .uk zone. | Technical requirements assessed | |
| Phishing feeds | We are evaluating several additional sources of phishing information that could enhance the value and accuracy of our phishing feed. | Ongoing | |
| Completed | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Project title | Summary | Completion date | |
| Business intelligence | We are re-designing our data warehousing system in order to provide business intelligence data for internal and external systems. Currently we provide statistics on your .uk business levels through the registrar dashboard. Our Business Intelligence program will provide the data in more granular format to give flexible reporting to help you manage your .uk registration business. | October 2011 | |
| Database restructure | Based on the findings of our ongoing systems usability research we are making some changes to the way that we structure our database. We are reworking our database and Online Service so that registrant data is represented in a domain centric rather than account centric way. We are removing the need for users to log in to our Online Service by role and are creating a simpler log in based on contact email addresses and passwords. Registrars will no longer need to log in and out to look at information for different tags or roles but will instead be able to see all the services that they have permissions to access. We have reduced the number of registrant contact email addresses that a registrant contact can have from three to one. Registrar contacts remain unchanged. There will be some changes to the EPP and Automaton commands as a result of the data restructure and these are detailed here. | September 2011 | |
| Signing .uk | As part of the global effort to improve the security of DNS, along with other registries, we are implementing DNSSEC in the zones under our management. DNSSEC prevents the interception of and tampering with DNS queries between nameservers, making the Internet safer. We have a full explanation of what DNSSEC is and what it does. In March we signed .uk, and we are now planning the signing at the second level under .uk, including .co.uk. We will provide details of the next phase of the DNSSEC roll-out over the coming months, together with updates and guidance on the benefits and impacts of DNSSEC for you and your customers. We anticipate signing .co.uk by March 2011 and complete our DNSSEC rollout to the other 2nd level zones by mid summer 2011. | May 2011 | |
| DRS system development | Improvements to usability and workflow to the Dispute Resolution Service online system | December 2010 | |
| PRSS | We have launched a new PRSS Beta service that will replace the existing system. During development both systems will be available to subscribers. The beta system is faster and offers more flexible search functions. The beta system has been developed on an ongoing basis with functionality release in a number of phases. New functions include: range search on registration dates, registrant search and flexible sorting options. The new PRSS will also implement a similarity search algorithm along with email notifications against pre-set search terms. Development will be closely aligned to user requirements and we will introduce functionality in phased releases with user feedback at each stage. The new service will be complete in November 2010, and following a period of evaluation and testing will replace the existing PRSS service in February 2011. | November 2010 | |
| Usability review | We have researched how customers use our online services and are making a number of changes to the design and layout of processes to improve usability. The first part of this project saw the release of improved versions of our registrar change and registrant transfer processes. This next stage sees those improvements to design and layout applied to all other processes in online services. These are predominantly cosmetic changes and do not require any action from registrars. | November 2010 | |
| IPv6 | Implementation of IPv6 on all external facing services | September 2010 | |
| Account security | We are providing Online Service account holders with an additional layer of security for logging into their account. Currently log in requires the username (email address) and a password. We will offer account holders the option of switching on enhanced security. This will require an additional pass phrase to be set, and users will be asked for 3 characters from the phrase in order to log into their account. We are also making some changes to the security questions used for password recovery. | September 2010 | |
Related contacts
For questions from our members and registrars Telephone: 01865 332233 Email: support@nominet.org.uk To make a payment Telephone: 01865 332348 Email: payments@nominet.org.uk Emergency out of hours support for registrars Telephone: 01606 866663
If you need any more advice, request a call back and discuss your query with one of our advisors.
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