Version 7 New Domain Look Up is Useless

[yggdrasil]

Forgive me if I’m wrong with this but I just upgraded to v7 and I must be honest, the new domain look up provider with suggestion is nice but very much useless.

 

Let me explain why. I thought you could set this per extensions or groups of extensions. To my surprise this is globally, for all extensions or none. This is bad because I have more than one registrar and some extensions are not available in another one. One the thing I like about WHMCS is how flexible it is, and you can switch registrars between extensions. What happen to this approach of flexibility and granularity for settings?

 

Not only they removed the domain bulk registration and other domain pages from the templates in v7 but they are over simplifying how domain ordering works. I used so far, the standard Whois look up and I always had problem with country level domains that have no whois or limit them. Yes, some even limit the queries like to 5 per day which is useless. So, I said, wow, with v7 this is finally solved, as I can use the API from the registrar to use its domain look up.

 

No. You can’t.

 

The problem is that if I choose one domain look up provider, the other extensions which that registrar does not sell will not work because they don’t offer a look up for those extensions. This means I should switch back to the standard lookup or use one single registrar. This is bad folks.

 

Why did development do this? You should be able to select the domain look up, standard of from a registrar you are using PER each extension so you can choose which ones for which extensions. Not globally. Maybe this can be done, if yes, then please apologize, but right now this is very much useless if its applying the look up setting to all extensions or none.

 

I’m also not happy on how the new domain form works. Its fast, nice, yes, but it’s so dumbed down that it feels they rushed with v7 and decided to remove tons of things so they could release it faster. From v5 to v6 they removed templates and features, from v6 to v7 even more was removed. It seems WHMCS is removing things from the customer side and templates and just focusing in adding things in the admin side. Customers is what gives us money and we can’t pay WHMCS without them, so please start focusing on adding customer side features as well instead of removing them…

 

Really! You removed and changed templates which is fine if you are going to offer a replacement but you didn’t. This is like how they removed the option for customers to see how much credits they have in their account because they removed it from the templates and now they have to open tickets because they don’t know or can’t see how many positive credits are available (in v6 it was removed).

 

For my surprise now a customer CANNOT select a particular extension, cannot see which extensions are actually available for buying and they can’t bulk transfer or see the full domain price list either. This is so over simplified that its way worse than in v6, really bad. You removed a full chunk of things in v7 in particular for domains ordering, and tons of ordering forms were also removed or deprecated so not sure if this is consider an upgrade but a downgrade.

 

[brian!]

Forgive me if I’m wrong with this but I just upgraded to v7 and I must be honest, the new domain look up provider with suggestion is nice but very much useless.

i'd like to write a detailed argument against what you've posted above - but I simply can't... you're absolutely correct.

 

there are lots of bad things about v7 lookups, you've highlighted some issues... there are others.

 

Not only they removed the domain bulk registration and other domain pages from the templates in v7 but they are over simplifying how domain ordering works. I used so far, the standard Whois look up and I always had problem with country level domains that have no whois or limit them. Yes, some even limit the queries like to 5 per day which is useless. So, I said, wow, with v7 this is finally solved, as I can use the API from the registrar to use its domain look up.

 

No. You can’t.

 

The problem is that if I choose one domain look up provider, the other extensions which that registrar does not sell will not work because they don’t offer a look up for those extensions. This means I should switch back to the standard lookup or use one single registrar. This is bad folks.

 

Why did development do this? You should be able to select the domain look up, standard of from a registrar you are using PER each extension so you can choose which ones for which extensions. Not globally. Maybe this can be done, if yes, then please apologize, but right now this is very much useless if its applying the look up setting to all extensions or none.

to be fair to WHMCS on this point (and it can pain me sometimes to be so!), what I believe happens with v7 lookups (if you're using a lookup provider) is that it will first try to use the API lookup for that TLD... if the registrar (lookup provider) you're using doesn't sell that TLD, then WHMCS falls back to using standard whois... if it's not in the whois file, then WHMCS just says its unavailable.

 

i've tested this, using an obscure ccTLD that my lookup provider doesn't offer, but who i've added to the custom whois file, and it's lookups work fine.

 

Really! You removed and changed templates which is fine if you are going to offer a replacement but you didn’t. This is like how they removed the option for customers to see how much credits they have in their account because they removed it from the templates and now they have to open tickets because they don’t know or can’t see how many positive credits are available (in v6 it was removed).

which, as you probably are aware, sentq was able to fix with his sidebar hook... WHMCS did a similar thing in v7 with the removal of the TLD pricing table... I can't remember reading any posts complaining about that table, but in their infinite wisdom, they removed it in v7... it was left for another poster to post a pricing table php page, and i've posted a data feed that is similar... then when users complained, WHMCS said they'd add a pricing page "in the future"... don't hold your breath waiting for that to appear... could be tomorrow, could be next year.

 

we really shouldn't need to be spending time re-adding things removed by WHMCS - they should have enough sense not to remove them in the first place.

 

For my surprise now a customer CANNOT select a particular extension, cannot see which extensions are actually available for buying and they can’t bulk transfer or see the full domain price list either. This is so over simplified that its way worse than in v6, really bad. You removed a full chunk of things in v7 in particular for domains ordering, and tons of ordering forms were also removed or deprecated so not sure if this is consider an upgrade but a downgrade.

yep - the number of posts that I read/replied to from those that have upgraded (without first testing) and then realise they've lost a lot of domain functionality that they previously had is just sad.

 

i'm not optimistic v7 lookups will improve significantly in future updates... i'm waiting (or dreading!) to see what v8 will bring at the end of the year.

[yggdrasil]

Ok, thank you for that. It would be nicer if they said that in the instructions or help docs…

 

So, if the extension is not available in the selected look up provider it will fail to the Standard Whois settings (my current whois config)?

 

If that is true, then this would not be such a big problem to what I complained. Does this by any chance include the Standard Whois suggestions as well? I guess not…

 

I knew about the pricing tables and other things removed, before upgrading. I read someone complaining about that even last year. The thing is that I agree with you. We should not be spending time adding code and hacks to get back things that where there in the past. If someone does not want something, sure, he can remove the code in his custom templates, but having to add them back in each upgrade is way more work than just disabling or removing code you don’t want or use. This seems to me like they didn’t bother to properly add the code back or didn’t had time. Even if you don’t use them right now in your installation these are things that tons of WHMCS customers probably use and had links or

 

Please don’t mention v8. It took me a week to merge and remove all the code from v6 to v7. Yes, a few days at the minimum, and I’m still not completely done either…because WHMCS decided to merge all the CSS into one file and removed tons of files or moved them around, including JavaScript and others. If you are already using JQuery, bootstrap, etc, it’s a lot of work so they don’t conflict with the ones in WHMCS. I don’t even want a new version anymore, because they make you do a full upgrade (which I hate…) vs just the changed, deleted or removed files which would be way easier. To be fair, 7.1 added more things and makes it a bit more interesting, but 7.0 was rushed.

 

I still think they should allow to select the lookup setting per individual extensions or let you create groups of TLD that use a specific setting. This way you can use the Standard for some extensions, one Registrar for some extensions, and others for the rest. This should be granular and flexible vs the everything or nothing approach.

[yggdrasil]

UPDATE

 

I just tested what you posted before Brian and for my misfortune it does not work. I tested a country level domain which works with my standard whoisservers.php config file, when I switch to any LogicBoxes Registrar as Whois Lookup it does not work anymore (as they don’t offer that extension). It shows as unavailable. I switch back to the Standard Whois and its working again.

 

Are you sure what you posted is correct? If the extension is not available in the lookup registrar’s API it’s not falling back to my Whois servers config in my installation.

Edited February 7, 2017 by yggdrasil

[brian!]

Are you sure what you posted is correct? If the extension is not available in the lookup registrar’s API it’s not falling back to my Whois servers config in my installation.

i'm pretty sure it was during v7 or perhaps the betas - but testing again on v7.1.1, I now believe I was wrong and it's not cascading down.

 

in the v7 dev, I have .augustow.pl added to domain pricing (I doubt any major registrar is going to resell that!) - so if I run the lookup through resellerclub, 'dfdfdsfdsfsf.augustow.pl' is unavailable (wrong!)... switch to standard whois (using a custom whois file) and it is available (correct!).

 

I suppose if your registrar is a lookup provider within WHMCS and you only sell the TLDs from that one registrar, it's probably fine... expand beyond that and want to use multiple registrars, sell TLDs that use whois servers etc (hardly radical!) then it's of very limited use.

 

there are some good new features in v7 and v7.1, but also some bloody daft ones - let's just say that, from my perspective, i've never found a good enough reason to run v7+ on a live site that sells domains.

 

btw - v7 won't be using whoisservers.php... that's another one of the things that they changed.

[yggdrasil]

i'm pretty sure it was during v7 or perhaps the betas - but testing again on v7.1.1, I now believe I was wrong and it's not cascading down.

 

in the v7 dev, I have .augustow.pl added to domain pricing (I doubt any major registrar is going to resell that!) - so if I run the lookup through resellerclub, 'dfdfdsfdsfsf.augustow.pl' is unavailable (wrong!)... switch to standard whois (using a custom whois file) and it is available (correct!).

 

I suppose if your registrar is a lookup provider within WHMCS and you only sell the TLDs from that one registrar, it's probably fine... expand beyond that and want to use multiple registrars, sell TLDs that use whois servers etc (hardly radical!) then it's of very limited use.

 

there are some good new features in v7 and v7.1, but also some bloody daft ones - let's just say that, from my perspective, i've never found a good enough reason to run v7+ on a live site that sells domains.

 

btw - v7 won't be using whoisservers.php... that's another one of the things that they changed.

 

It’s definitely not working in 7.1, I deleted the whoisservers.php so it defaults to the new JSON config, but it actually doesn’t work either. Its not falling back.

I tested for example .cl which is included in the default WHMCS Whois servers (also in the new JSON format). Using ResellerClub all of them fail, not available, switch to Standard Whois and it works fine.

 

This is not an option for me. There are plenty of country level domains which are not available in most registrars which I offer. I cannot use the new premium domains or API lookup from the registrars because of this but if I don’t I cannot offer any new TLD domains either. In the standard Whois every extension from Donuts fails for me, but they work fine if you use the Whois API. But then I have to stick to only the extensions they offer.

 

This is horrible. You must now stick to one specific registrar.

[brian!]

In the standard Whois every extension from Donuts fails for me, but they work fine if you use the Whois API. But then I have to stick to only the extensions they offer.

on a sidenote, if Donuts domains are failing with standard whois, then you're likely hitting their whois lookup limits - e.g you probably have too many of their TLDs in your suggestion options.

 

I think WHMCS did mention in a post/blog somewhere that this is only the first step and it will "develop", but that's no help to those of have upgraded and lost previous functionality.

 

what they should really do in the future releases (I suppose v8 is the next biggie) is get a group of users together (online if necessary) and say we're planning on doing x,y and z in the future - what do you think? I don't mean at the beta stage, or even alpha - i'm talking before then... once it reaches beta, then they'll tinker around the edges, but I can't recall any feature being abandoned.. god knows they've sprung surprises on us in the past, by adding untested features to the first final!

 

i'd like to hope that if this had happened previously, we could have nipped this lookup nonsense, or even the admin email logo etc, in the bud before it ever got out to beta.

[yggdrasil]

I didn’t even started to offer those new Donuts TLD either, the reason was that most of them never worked for me.

 

I think this is related to the massive amounts of suggestions v6 was doing. Someone was searching just a dot com and I saw in the Whois log that WHMCS actually searched all TLD’s, this was also the reason it took so long. This seems to be fixed in v7 and lookups are quick again.

 

I do need to use the API for whois lookups and most people should because most registrars do limit or block queries from the public in general. I do have the IP of my server registered with some local cTLDs providers and an account so those are not limited to me and I can use their direct Whois query, but I don’t have this for every domain and of course using the Registrars API provides you suggestions and premium names and you are off loading the queries to them. Its preferred vs direct Whois but I still need to use my Whois file for some extensions because I need direct Whois queries for some stuff.

 

Right now, it’s either, one or the other. You can’t use both which affects me. It means I have to keep using the Standard Whois and I still can’t offer all the new launched extensions. I do agree with you and they have a Beta program but I feel WHMCS developers are a bit disconnected with how people are using WHMCS for their business or customer’s offerings. It’s a positive thing they integrated this type of Whois lookups but without the fall back you mentioned or a setting to set the Standard Whois for some extensions it has little use to me. I can’t turn it on because it turns my Whois config off. It also has little use for people offering custom domains or their own Whois servers or people that use more than one registrars because chances are they are not going to have the same extensions. You can’t really use different registrars with WHMCS if you can’t use different Whois servers.