whois

whois

   An {Internet} directory service for looking up names of people
   on a remote server.  Many servers respond to {TCP} queries on
   {port} 43, in a manner roughly analogous to the {DDN} {NIC}
   whois service described in {RFC} 954.  Other sites provide
   this directory service via the {finger} {protocol} or accept
   queries by {electronic mail} for directory information.  On
   {Unix} the client command is

   	whois -h server_name person_name

   You can also type "telnet server_name 43" and then type the
   person's name on a separate line.  For a list of whois
   servers, FTP/Gopher: sipb.mit.edu.  Or

   	whois -h sipb.mit.edu whois-servers

   As the above command demonstrates, whois can find information
   about things other than users, e.g. domains, networks and
   hosts.

   See also {finger}, {X.500}, {white pages}.