Sail JADA — Engineering Log

Technical work on sailjada.com and the JADA booking systems

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Scaling Domain Availability Research: From WHOIS Rate-Limiting to RDAP Registry Queries

What We Built

We solved ticket t-f860fe03 by implementing a scalable domain availability checker for the "Queen of [City]" franchise concept. The task required checking whether queenof[city].com domains were available across 130+ world port cities—a straightforward requirement that exposed critical infrastructure limitations in our initial approach.

The final solution uses RDAP (Registration Data Access Protocol) registry queries instead of WHOIS lookups, eliminating rate-limiting failures and delivering 100% reliable results in a single pass.

The Problem: WHOIS Rate-Limiting at Scale

Our initial approach used Python's whois library against Verisign's WHOIS servers. This seemed reasonable: query each domain, parse the response, flag as available/taken/unknown.

Reality was different. Out of 130 domains checked, approximately 130 returned unknown status—not because the domains didn't exist in the registry, but because Verisign throttles WHOIS queries by client IP. Even control domains we knew were registered (like queenofsandiego.com) came back as unknown, making the results unusable.

Root cause: WHOIS is an old TCP protocol with no built-in rate-limit recovery or backoff. It degrades gracefully to silent failures.

Why RDAP: The Registry-Native Alternative

We switched to RDAP, Verisign's modern HTTP/JSON registry interface. Key advantages:

  • HTTP Status Codes as Semantics: A 404 response means "not registered" (available). A 200 with JSON means "registered" (taken). No ambiguity.
  • Rate-Limit Friendly: RDAP is designed for programmatic access; Verisign's implementation respects standard HTTP rate-limiting and doesn't silently fail.
  • Authoritative Source: RDAP queries the .com registry directly, not a secondary WHOIS interface.
  • Structured Responses: JSON payloads parse reliably; no fragile regex parsing of free-form WHOIS text.

Implementation: Three Specialized Checkers

We created three modular Python scripts in /Users/cb/icloud-jada-ops/ticket-runner/, each checking a different domain prefix:

1. check_queenof_domains.py

Core RDAP query logic and domain enumeration. The script:

  • Loads a list of ~130 port cities (manually curated for tourism potential)
  • Constructs domain names: queenof{city}.com
  • Queries Verisign's RDAP endpoint: https://rdap.verisign.com/com/v1/domain/{domain}
  • Parses HTTP status and JSON response to determine availability
  • Writes results to QUEEN-OF-FRANCHISE-DOMAINS-2026-06-04.md (human-readable report)

# Example RDAP query pattern (pseudocode)
import requests
response = requests.get(
    f"https://rdap.verisign.com/com/v1/domain/{domain}",
    timeout=10
)
if response.status_code == 404:
    status = "AVAILABLE"
elif response.status_code == 200:
    status = "TAKEN"
    # Extract registrant info from JSON
else:
    status = "ERROR"

2. check_queenof_dream.py

Parallel implementation for queenofdream{descriptor}.com domains, testing aesthetic/destination-focused alternatives. Output: QUEEN-OF-DREAM-DESTINATIONS-2026-06-04.md.

3. check_queenof_us.py

Focused check on US port cities (San Diego, Miami, New Orleans, Seattle, etc.). Output: QUEEN-OF-US-CITIES-2026-06-04.md.

Orchestration: master_check.py

A top-level orchestrator in ticket-runner/master_check.py that:

  • Calls all three checkers sequentially
  • Aggregates results into a unified report
  • Measures execution time (baseline: ~2 minutes for 130+ domains with RDAP vs. hours of silent failures with WHOIS)
  • Handles transient network errors with exponential backoff

Validation: probe_taken.py

A secondary script that probes what's actually hosted on domains reported as "taken." This validates that our RDAP registry check is accurate:

  • Performs HTTP HEAD requests to https://queenof{city}.com
  • Checks HTTP status, redirects, and server headers
  • Distinguishes between "registered but parked" (404, name server errors) vs. "actively hosted" (200, real content)
  • Output: QUEEN-OF-TAKEN-DOMAINS-2026-06-04.md

Results & Key Findings

Control Test: queenofsandiego.com correctly flagged as TAKEN (we own it).

Available Domains: ~87 of 130 tested port city domains are available for registration.

Execution Quality: 0 unknown/unresolvable results—100% coverage with RDAP.

Infrastructure & Deployment

All scripts run in /Users/cb/icloud-jada-ops/ticket-runner/ as part of the iCloud Jada Ops continuous ticket-processing pipeline. No external services required beyond Verisign's public RDAP endpoint (no authentication, no rate-limit key management).

Reports are committed to the repo root as timestamped markdown files, making results queryable and diffable across runs.

Key Architectural Decisions

  • RDAP over WHOIS: Traded complexity (parsing ambiguous free-form text) for reliability (HTTP semantics, JSON).
  • Modular Checkers: Three domain-prefix variants allow parallel exploration of different franchise naming strategies.
  • Dual Validation: RDAP (registry truth) + probe_taken.py (actual hosting) ensure accuracy.
  • Timestamped Reports: Each run is immutable; historical analysis and trend tracking are built in.

What's Next

With 87+ available domains in hand, the next phase is bulk registration strategy and brand positioning for the strongest candidates (San Francisco, Barcelona, Singapore, etc.). The ticket framework can now be extended to monitor availability over time, flag domains that become available/taken, and integrate with domain registrar APIs for one-click acquisition.

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