README

A PHP library to communicate with the RIPE NCC database.

Requirements

The RipeDB-Client requires PHP 7.0 up to PHP 7.4. The connection object might have further preconditions.

Installation

You can install the RIPE client via composer

composer require dormilich/ripedb-client:^1.1

or by cloning this repository.

Tests

To run the offline tests run:

phpunit

on the command line from the project’s root directory.

There is also an online test you can run if you have an internet connection, which runs some basic operations on the RIPE TEST database.

phpunit --group live

Should these tests fail with an HTTP status code of 409 then the used IP range (127.0.0.0/24) is already occupied otherwise and needs to be cleaned up first. You may also have to disable PHPUnit’s error conversion.

Setup

In order to create the HTTP connection with the RIPE REST Service you need to create a connection object that implements the ClientAdapter interface. Depending on your PHP version, or your own preference you can use any existing library or write one using PHP’s curl or socket functions.

If you’re not convenient doing this you can use the Guzzle6Adapter from the tests/Test folder (although you might want to change the namespace).

Usage

For the web service there are four options you can set before using it:

environment - whether to connect to the RIPE (WebService::PRODUCTION) or TEST (WebService::SANDBOX) database. Per default, it connects to the TEST database. You may set any other name for local testing.
username - the username part of the API key.
password - for any modifying operation (create/update/delete) you must provide the password part of the API key.
location - for local testing any URL that connects to the mock instance. The production/sandbox environments will set their appropriate location automatically.

For more information check out the RIPE Database Documentation.

Setting up the web service object

Starting from 2026

Since MD5-based password are retired starting from 2026, you need to use one of the API key that you can create in your RIPE account.

// create the connection object
$client = new Client(…);

// create the web service object
$ripe   = new WebService($client, [
	'environment' => WebService::PRODUCTION,
	'username'    => 'your API username',
	'password'    => 'your API password',
]);

// you can set also these options separately
$ripe   = new WebService($client);
$ripe->setEnvironment(WebService::PRODUCTION);
$ripe->setUsername('your API username');
$ripe->setPassword('your API password');

// or using a URL
$ripe   = new WebService($client);
$ripe->setHost('https://username:password@rest.db.ripe.net/ripe');

Before 2026

As long as passwords are supported, they can be used in conjunction with the maintainer handle. If that is not given explicitly, it will be taken from the object that is processed (lookup queries do not require authentication).

// create the connection object
$client = new Client(…);

// create the web service object
$ripe   = new WebService($client, [
	'environment' => WebService::PRODUCTION,
	'username'    => 'TEST-MNT', // optional
	'password'    => 'your maintainer password',
]);

Create a RIPE DB entry

try {
	// create a RIPE object
	$me = new Person;

	// setting attributes via array style
	$me['person'] = 'John Doe';

	// setting multiple-valued attributes via array style
	$me['phone']  = [
		'+1 234 56789', 
		'+1 432 98765', 
	];

	// setting attributes via method
	$me
		->addAttribute('address', 'Any Street 1')
		->addAttribute('address', 'Anytown')
	;

	// create object in DB
	$me = $ripe->create($me);

	// display result
	echo '<pre>', $me, '</pre>';
}
catch (RPSLException $e) {
	// errors regarding the setup of the RIPE object
}
// using Guzzle 6 exceptions as example, 
// your client implementation may use different exceptions
catch (BadResponseException $e) {
	$errors = WebService::getErrors($e->getResponse()->getBody()));
}

Note: the webservice will set the source attribute depending on its setting, so you don’t need to set it yourself except when you want to use the serializer or the isValid() method before that.

Update a RIPE DB entry

try {
	// create a RIPE object with the object’s primary key
	$jd = new Person('JD123-RIPE');

	// fetch the object from the DB
	$jd = $ripe->read($jd);

	// modify the object
	$jd['e-mail'] = 'john.doe@example.com';

	// save the changes
	$jd = $ripe->update($jd);
}
catch (RPSLException $e) {
	// errors regarding the setup of the RIPE object
}
catch (BadResponseException $e) {
	$errors = WebService::getErrors($e->getResponse()->getBody()));
}

Note: each RIPE object contains at least the created and last-modified generated attributes. The latter of them is (obviously) only actual after the update therefore update() returns the latest object instance.

RIPE references

Some attributes contain references to other RIPE objects (e.g. tech-c, admin-c, mnt-*). When you fetch an object from the RIPE database, for these attributes a special value object (AttributeValue) is created that can provide you the type and lookup object (an object with the primary key set to be used in the read() method) of the referenced object.

RIPE comments

The RIPE DB uses the hash sign (#) for denoting comments. When fetching an attribute with comments, these are transmitted separately from the attribute value. For these case the AttributeValue object will be used as well. When accessing the attribute value as string, the comment will be appended.

Notes

Object validation uses RIPE DB version 1.112.

dormilich / ripedb-client

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