ultrix man page for whois

whois(1)							    Unsupported 							  whois(1)

Name
       whois - DARPA Internet user name directory service

Syntax
       whois [ -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
       International.  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 registered 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 complex 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).

Examples
       whois 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
       automatically provide information on how to single out one record.  Remember to put quotes around strings that contain `!' characters.

See Also
       RFC 812:  Nicname/Whois

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