Skip to content

Following Link Targets

The RDAP client supports following links in RDAP responses to fetch additional related information. This allows you to traverse relationships between entities, domains, networks, and other RDAP objects.

The client provides several arguments for controlling link following behavior:

Argument Description
--link-target Specifies a link target (e.g., "related", "rdap-up"). Use _none to disable link following.
--only-show-target When specified, only shows the link target response instead of all responses.
--min-link-depth The minimum number of times to query for a link target.
--max-link-depth The maximum number of times to query for a link target.

Preset Arguments

The client provides preset arguments that set multiple parameters at once for common use cases:

Argument Description
--registry Set link target parameters for a domain registry.
--registrar Set link target parameters for a domain registrar.
--up Set link target parameters for a parent network.
--down Set link target parameters for child networks.
--top Set link target parameters for the least specific network.
--bottom Set link target parameters for the most specific networks.

Default Behavior

Default link target behavior varies by query type:

Query Type Default Link Target Default Min Depth Default Max Depth
IP Address (IPv4/IPv6) None 1 1
CIDR (IPv4/IPv6) None 1 1
AS Number None 1 1
Domain "related" 1 3
Other None 1 1

Examples

Query the registry

rdap --registry example.com

This queries the domain and at the registry.

Query the registrar

rdap --registrar example.com

This queries the domain and at the registrar.

Query parent network

rdap --up 192.0.2.0

Follow the IP network referenced by "rdap-up" and "rdap-active" links.

Query child networks

rdap --down 192.0.2.0/24

Follow the IP network referenced by "rdap-down" and "rdap-active" links.

rdap --link-target related --min-link-depth 2 --max-link-depth 5 example.com

Follow the object referenced by "related" links with a minimum depth of 2 and maximum depth of 5.