Welcome to Our Summer 2004 e-newsletter. If you are interested in subscribing to this e-newsletter, you can sign-up here.

In this issue:

1.      About PNINA

2.      What's new

3.      Why use .ps instead of other top-level domains

4.      How to Register a .ps Domain Name

5.      Registration Policy Highlights

6.      .ps Domain Statistics

7.      Tech Tips…How DNS Works?

8.      THE Palestinian Domain Directory

About PNINA

To realize the Palestinian presence in the information age, an independent Palestinian National Internet Naming Authority (PNINA) was formed whose mission is to formulate the necessary registration policies for the PS domain and to set appropriate policies for enhancing Internet usage in Palestine. The organization is entrusted in managing all administrative, registration, technical and financial aspects of the .ps domain based on the international standards and best practices in this regard. PNINA is considered a unique entity that grouped all stakeholders of the Palestinian IT sector to make sure that it is managing the .ps domain, which is a valuable national asset for Palestine, to the best interest of the IT community and the Palestinian People.

This entity aims at creating a true partnership between the various Palestinian sectors in administering and managing such a national project. PNINA Board of Directors truly reflects this partnership since is made up of representatives from the Public, Private, Academic, and Legal sectors and institutions interested in advancing Internet usage in Palestine. PNINA endeavors to establish meaningful partnerships between these diverse Palestinian sectors in administering and managing the national Internet enterprise.

To learn more about PNINA and its organizational structure go to: http://www.pnina.ps/about/about.html

 What's new

1.      Click Here for more details about the PNINA Opening Press Coverage and Newspaper ads

2.      Regional and International Cooperation

a.      PNINA Participated at Gitex 2003 as exhibitor between Oct 14 and Oct 19, 2003

b.      PNINA participated at ICANN Meeting in Rome between 29/2 and 6/3/2004.

3.      Future Events

a.      Training Activities (DNS and Bind, DNS Security, DNS Management and Active Directory)

b.      Seminars/Workshops (DNS Marketing, IDN and Anycast Implementation)

For more details about these events, visit us at www.pnina.ps

Why use .ps instead of other top-level domains?

 1     Be the first.

As a new ccTLD .ps offers vast and exciting opportunities for claiming valuable on-line real estate with key words that can identify your business in a unique and memorable way. The best names tend to be easy to say, easy to remember and easy to key into the Internet address box. Take advantage of this opportunity to stake your Internet claim before competitors.

 2     Promote Palestine.

Whether you reside in, or are linked to Palestine, .ps advertises your connection. Your country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) .ps communicates the Palestinian identity. As one of the Middle East region’s fastest-growing Internet communities, Palestine and the Palestinian technology business are increasingly being associated with international best practices on-line. The .ps address positions you with Palestine brand leaders.

 3     Stand out from the crowd.

Other Top Level Domains (TLDs) like .com and .net are associated with commercial business. The TLD .org simply means "non-commercial” and, like the other commonly used domains, has no geography associated with it. The .ps domain is the newest technology address for Palestine. Move away from anonymity and sameness when you register a .ps address.

 4     Full Domain Management from anywhere in the world (coming soon…)

Fast and secure access to your domain from anywhere in the world

 5      Super fast Domain Name resolution

We have name Servers in Palestine (3), Europe (2), USA (2) and soon we’ll have servers in Japan and Australia.

How to Register under the .ps Domain

óStep 1: Read Registration Policy and Procedures

                  (http://www.pnina.ps/registration/policy.html)

óStep 2: Lookup the new Domain Name

                  (http://www.pnina.ps/whois/whois.html)

óStep 3: Check Certified Registrars List

                 (http://www.pnina.ps/registrars/registrars.html)
óStep 4: Choose a Certified Registrar (CR)
óStep 5: Contact the CR and Fill out the Domain

                  Registration Application Form

          (http://www.pnina.ps/registration/PSFORM-REGISTER.doc)
óStep 6: Pay Registration Fees to the chosen Certified

          Registrar
óStep 7: The Certified Registrar and PNINA will do the

          rest
óStep 8: Test your new domain when notified by CR and

          PNINA (http://www.checkdns.net)

Registration Policy Highlights

·          Domain Names under the .ps domain and the contents they point to, are considered virtual extensions of the Palestinian sovereignty with applicability of Palestinian law to the said extensions

·          In principle, the registration of names under ps is open to any entity inside and outside Palestine.

·          An entity can register any number of domain names under the .ps domain.

·          Only applications with correct and complete information will be considered for registration.

·          All applications will be processed on equal basis and according to the first-come-first-serve principle.

·          PNINA can register domain names directly under the .ps domain or under: com.ps, org.ps and net.ps.

·          The name should not interfere with the rights of a third party.

·          The name can’t be any of the protected ones as defined by PNINA in its protected names database.

To read the complete Registration Policy, go to http://www.pnina.ps/registration/policy.html 

Statistics(Since Jan 15^th, 2004)

For complete statistics of the .ps domain, go to http://www.pnina.ps/statistics/statistics.html

Tech Tips, How DNS Works?

A DNS Example

When you type the URL www.pnina.ps into your browser, the browser contacts the Domain Name Server (DNS) at your ISP to get the IP address. A DNS server would start its search for an IP address by contacting one of the root DNS servers. The root servers know the IP addresses for all of the DNS servers that handle the top-level domains (.COM, .NET, .ORG, etc.) and country code top-level-domains (ccTLD) such as .ps. Your DNS server would ask the root for www.pnina.ps, and the root would say, "I don't know the IP address for www.pnina.ps, but here's the IP address for one of the .ps DNS servers." Your DNS then sends a query to the .ps DNS server asking it if it knows the IP address for www.pnina.ps. The DNS server for the ps domain knows the IP addresses for the name servers handling the pnina.ps domain, so it returns this IP. Your name server then contacts one of the DNS servers for pnina.ps and asks if it knows the IP address for www.pnina.ps. It actually does, so it returns the IP address to your DNS server, which returns it to the browser, which can then contact the server for www.pnina.ps to get a Web page.

One of the keys to making this work is redundancy. There are multiple DNS servers at every level, so that if one fails, there are others to handle the requests. The other key is caching. Once a DNS server resolves a request, it caches the IP address it receives. Once it has made a request to a root DNS server for any .ps domain, it knows the IP address for a DNS server handling the .ps domain, so it doesn't have to bug the root DNS servers again for that information.  

You can read more about how DNS works at: http://www.pnina.ps/library/dns.html

The .ps Directory

For the complete List go to http://www.pnina.ps/statistics/all.html

That's all for now.
Please forward this to a friend if you'd like. Stay tuned for our upcoming issue next month!