Domain Search

Brainstorm brandable names, find which domains can really be registered, and screen the shortlist before the user buys.

What the statuses mean

• AVAILABLE: the registry itself has no registration (registry RDAP 404, or its WHOIS

says "not found"). It can still be premium-priced or reserved; confirm at a registrar.

• TAKEN: the registry has a record, or the name is delegated in DNS.
• UNKNOWN: no registry answered (no RDAP server and no usable WHOIS, or rate-limited).

Never present UNKNOWN as available. Say which names need a manual check.

Recommended flow

1. Bulk screen with Instant Domain Search when its MCP tools are in the session

(free, no key; server https://mcp.instantdomainsearch.com/mcp). Use check_domain_availability (up to 50 full domains per call), search_domains (one name across TLDs) and generate_domain_variations (.com alternatives). Results add what the script cannot: registry premium prices, aftermarket listings with prices (Atom, Afternic, Sedo) and etldCount (how many TLDs already hold the name; high means contested). Its status comes from a daily index, so treat it as a filter, not a verdict.

1. Confirm the shortlist live with scripts/check-domains.sh (below). Its answer is

the one to report.

1. Confirm the price at a registrar right before buying: Cloudflare Registrar sells at

cost; Porkbun is a good second quote. Run the script with --no-cache first.

Without the MCP tools, run step 2 on every candidate and warn that premium and for-sale status is unchecked.

The script

bash scripts/check-domains.sh --tlds com,ai,io acme otherword   # names x TLDs
bash scripts/check-domains.sh acme.com acme.ai foo.co            # explicit domains
bash scripts/check-domains.sh --json --tlds com,ai acme          # adds "source"

Output: ✅ AVAILABLE / ❌ taken / ❓ unknown (with the reason). --json returns domain, status, source (rdap, whois or doh), detail and cached. Bare names without --tlds are checked as .com. In zsh, pass names as separate arguments or an array: an unquoted $NAMES is not word-split.

How it decides, per domain, in parallel (Python 3 standard library, no key):

1. DNS-over-HTTPS (Cloudflare) NS lookup: a delegated name is TAKEN. A missing

delegation proves nothing, so those names go on to the registry. Local dig is not used; networks that intercept DNS make it wrong.

1. Registry RDAP, found through the IANA bootstrap (cached daily) plus overrides for

registries missing from it (.co, .io, .me, .sh). rdap.org is never used: for TLDs it has no server for it answers 404, which the old script reported as AVAILABLE (google.io, google.co and google.me all showed as available).

1. Registry WHOIS (port 43) when a TLD has no RDAP or its server refuses us.
2. Otherwise UNKNOWN.

Rate limits: parallel requests are capped per registry (Verisign 8, Google 4, Identity Digital 1, others 2). A Retry-After up to 30 s is honored; a longer one switches that registry to WHOIS and is remembered across runs so the lockout is not extended. Results are cached for 6 hours in ${XDG_CACHE_HOME:-~/.cache}/domain-search/; --no-cache forces fresh checks and --no-doh skips the DNS step.

Naming workflow

1. Understand the product first: repo, README, the user's notes. Names must fit the

positioning, audience and tone.

1. Brainstorm in styles: real words, coined or portmanteau words, foreign words,

compounds, verb + suffix (-ly, -ify). Short dictionary words are almost always taken on .com; compounds and coined words are where .com wins are.

1. Screen, confirm, then gate the shortlist (flow above, quality gate below).
2. Present by availability, leading with the user's preferred TLD, one line each on

what the name evokes, plus price or listing when known.

Default TLDs: .com and .ai; add .io/.dev/.app for developer tools. If the user already owns domains, check whether one fits before suggesting purchases.

Multi-agent pipeline

For a large brainstorm with several agents:

1. Naming lanes in parallel, each with a different style constraint (coined,

compound, real word, foreign word, verb + suffix). Lanes make no network calls; each returns a plain list.

1. One checking stage: the lead merges and de-duplicates every list, then runs one

Instant Domain Search pass and one script run. Never let each agent run the checker: they share one IP and its rate limits, and parallel runs trip registry lockouts.

1. Scoring in parallel on a shortlist of 10-15 available names: each scorer runs the

quality gate below on its share.

1. The lead ranks and presents the result.

Name-quality gate (search and answer engines)

What the evidence says:

• Keywords in the domain give no ranking boost. Google: "the keywords in the name of the

domain (or URL path) alone have hardly any effect beyond appearing in breadcrumbs" (SEO Starter Guide). Pick the name for the brand.

• Google treats .ai, .io, .co and .me as generic, like .com, not as country

targeting (managing multi-regional sites). .sh is not on that list.

• .io has a sovereignty risk: the UK's agreement to transfer the Chagos Islands to

Mauritius could retire the IO country code, and IANA retires ccTLDs whose code is removed. Retirement comes with years of notice, but prefer another TLD for a brand meant to last.

• Answer engines resolve a distinctive coined name to one entity more reliably than a

dictionary word, which competes with the word's meaning and every other user of it.

Check each shortlisted name:

• Search the exact name: who already ranks for it?
• Search Wikidata for existing entities with that name.
• Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity and Claude "What is <name>?" and note any existing entity.
• Trademarks: USPTO (Instant Domain Search search_trademarks, or USPTO search) and EUIPO

TMview in the classes the product uses.

• Handles: X, GitHub, npm, Instagram, LinkedIn. Also app-store names.
• Radio test: at most 3 syllables, one obvious spelling when heard, no digits or hyphens.

At launch, publish Organization schema with sameAs links to every profile, and use one consistent category sentence ("<Name> is a <category> for <audience>") everywhere.

Pitfalls

• Shared IP rate limits. Identity Digital (.ai, .io, .me, .sh and many new

gTLDs) locked an IP out of RDAP for about 24 hours after a few quick requests. The script then uses WHOIS, which still answers, but keep batches small and never run checkers in parallel.

• Instant Domain Search is a daily index. search_domains reports false for TLDs it

does not cover; check_domain_availability reports null there. Confirm with the script.

• AVAILABLE is not a price. Registry premium and reserved names can pass the check;

the registrar's checkout is the final word.

• Cached answers are up to 6 hours old. Use --no-cache right before buying.