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Comment by maayank | Hacker News Reader

Posted the question to StackOverflow[1]. Debated with myself whether to post there or Server Fault, but here we are. Maybe it will be closed by the-powers-to-be as I'm not sure of the focus (I do want a programmable solution, i.e. an API)

[1] http://stackoverflow.com/questions/12954630/how-does-one-pro...

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I've done a little bit of domaining myself and the first thing to take away from any list is that recently dropped doesn't always equal available. Also you have guys that are running massive lists that perform thousands of buys requests per second across a massive number of domain name sellers in order to ensure they get to purchase the domain as soon as its released.

In terms of obtaining information, most whois queries can be performed via command line utilities... so to start you off here is a good list for whois servers (http://code.google.com/p/whois-servers-list/). Finally, check out each service, some will allow queries which will return true or false to being registered and generally you get a lot more of these requests then complete lookups (without being IP blacklisted)

Finally, in terms of building and managing an index, I believe manual crawling is the only option available... and start with dictionary terms and work out.

Edit: Read this as well - http://www.dotweekly.com/pending-delete-domain-name-drop-lis...

Some companies, such as GoDaddy have access to DNS zone files - this is the then resold to even more companies. Look at my reply to this article to see where you can get a list for free.

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