whois(1) Unsupported whois(1)Namewhois - DARPA Internet user name directory service
Syntaxwhois [ -h servername ] name
Description
The command allows you to look up people, hosts, and organizations in
the database kept by the Network Information Center (NIC) at SRI Inter‐
national. The name can be the last name of a registered user, or the
name of a registered Internet host, or other things recognized by the
whois server. Not all users, and only a few Internet hosts, are regis‐
tered with the NIC. If the name argument contains white space or other
special characters, you must surround it with double quote (") marks to
prevent its interpretation by the shell.
The WHOIS server at the NIC will provide more information on doing com‐
plex searches if you do
whois "?"
(note the quotes around the question mark), or even more information if
you do
whois help
Options-h servername Specifies the whois server on a host other than the
default (NIC.DDN.MIL).
Exampleswhois cerf
whois dec.com
whois-h ns.nic.ddn.mil knuth
whois smith
Note that the last example, at least, will match many records (and may
take fairly long to complete). The whois server at the NIC will auto‐
matically provide information on how to single out one record. Remem‐
ber to put quotes around strings that contain `!' characters.
See Also
RFC 812: Nicname/Whois
whois(1)