Domain Expiry monitoring with Topologix

Infrastructure & Networking

Watch when your domain registrations run out. You keep the list under Infrastructure → Domains — typed, pasted, or uploaded from Excel or CSV — and Topologix finds each domain's expiry date from its registry (RDAP first, WHOIS as the fallback), checks it every day, and alerts before it lapses. The optional Domain Expiry canvas node shows a group's worst status on a flow. It's part of the core product: free in every licence and never counted.

Requirements

• Nothing to install and no credentials: lookups run on the Topologix server, never through a proxy agent.
• Outbound HTTPS (443) to the registries' RDAP servers and to data.iana.org, and outbound TCP/43 for WHOIS. Registries without RDAP (.ge, .bg, .ro and others) answer only on TCP/43; if your firewall blocks it, those domains show WHOIS unreachable (TCP/43) and you can enter their dates by hand.
• To add, edit or delete domains you need to be a member of the organisation (see Rights). Alert settings are for the organisation owner or an admin.

1 · Set up the integration

1. Open the Domains pageGo to Infrastructure → Domains (or press ⌘K and type Domains). The list belongs to your organisation; without one, it is your personal list.
2. Add your domainsClick Add domains, then paste a list or drop an .xlsx, .csv or .txt file. Click Preview to see what will be added, what is already there, what is invalid (with its line number) and which subdomains were folded, then Apply.
3. Wait for the first checkNew domains show Pending; the first lookups run within a few minutes. Each row then shows the registrar, the expiry date, the days left, a status pill and where the date came from (RDAP, WHOIS or Manual).
4. Set up alertsClick Alerts on the Domains page to pick the channels, the warn and critical days, the minimum severity and the cooldown. Domain alerts also appear as cards on the Alerts page.

2 · Add it to a flow

1. Create the integrationPick Domain Expiry in the catalogue and click Create; there is nothing to configure. It reads the Domains list of the organisation you create it in. Test reports how many domains it can see and the soonest expiry.
2. Add it to a nodeClick a node, open Metrics, then + Add and choose the Domain Expiry integration. Pick All domains, one group, or Ungrouped only, and optionally your own warn / critical days for the node colour.
3. SaveThe card shows the soonest expiry, the warning / critical / expired / unknown counts and up to 200 domains, worst first. Open Domains jumps to the list.

3 · The Domains page

Everything about the list itself: getting domains in, how dates are found, and what to do when a registry will not say.

Adding domains

Paste domains one per line or separated by spaces, commas or semicolons, or drop a file. Topologix cleans up what you paste: it strips https://, paths, ports, a trailing dot and a leading www., lower-cases the name and converts international (IDN) names. Subdomains fold to the domain you actually register — shop.example.co.uk becomes example.co.uk — and the preview shows every fold before you apply it.

• Excel (.xlsx) is read in your browser: the first sheet, text and dates included. Save old .xls files as .xlsx or CSV first.
• CSV: a header row is optional. Recognised columns are domain (or name / host / url / fqdn / website), label, group, notes, tags and expiry (a manual date). Without a header the first column is the domain.
• Importing a domain that is already on the list only updates the fields you filled in, and only on rows you are allowed to edit.
• Limits: 2,000 domains per import and 5,000 per organisation. Upload files up to 2 MB.
• Export CSV gives the list back with the current expiry, days left, level and source; its manualExpiry column imports straight back.

How the expiry date is found

For each domain the server asks the registry, in this order:

1. RDAPThe modern, structured protocol. Topologix finds the registry's RDAP server in IANA's bootstrap list (cached for a day) and reads the expiration, registration and registrar from the answer. Most generic TLDs (.com, .net …) and many country ones (.pl, .uk …) answer here.
2. WHOISIf the registry has no RDAP, or RDAP gives no date, Topologix asks the registry's WHOIS server on TCP/43 (found through whois.iana.org) and reads the expiry line. It never guesses a date like 03/04/2026 where day and month could swap.
3. ManualA date you entered by hand always wins. The registry is still asked, so the registrar, the status and a lapse are still picked up.

• Each row's drawer shows the lookup evidence — the raw registry answer — as plain text, so you can see exactly what the registry said.
• A registry that returns 429 Too Many Requests or 503 is left alone for 15 minutes (or as long as it asks).

When the date is unknown

Some rows show Unknown instead of a date. The reason is always shown in plain words, and an unknown domain never alerts as if it had expired:

Entering an expiry by hand

Open a domain's drawer, type the date under Manual expiry and save. The manual date wins over the registry's, the source column shows Manual, and alerts work from it like any other date. Clear goes back to lookups. You can also fill an expiry column in a CSV or Excel import.

How often domains are checked

A background worker checks a few domains every five minutes, the most overdue first, and waits a second between two questions to the same registry. Each domain is checked once a day.

• Registries that never publish a date (.bg, .ro, .de, .eu …) are checked once a week, for status only: the date can never appear there, but a weekly status check still notices when a domain stops being registered (a lapse), even without a date.
• Check now in a drawer asks again right away (once a minute per domain); Check all now on the page re-checks every domain not already due (once every 10 minutes, owner or admin).
• Registry terms: nic.ge, register.bg and ROTLD forbid high-volume automated querying, which is why checks are spaced out, daily at most, and weekly for registries without dates. Please don't use the list for bulk research of domains you don't hold.

Alerts

Click Alerts on the Domains page (owner or admin):

• Warn (default 30 days before expiry) and Critical (default 7 days). A domain's own drawer can override both. Expired and lapsed domains always count as critical.
• Channels: the alert channels shared with your organisation (Slack, Teams, e-mail, webhook …). With none picked, domain alerts still show as cards on the Alerts page.
• Minimum severity (warning and critical, or critical only) and a cooldown in hours before the same domain alerts again.
• An alert is sent when a domain crosses a level (warning → critical → expired, or lapsed), and a recovery when it is renewed. Unknown dates don't alert every day; filter the list by Unknown to find the rows that need a manual date.
• Snooze: acknowledge the domain's card on the Alerts page (7 days), or snooze it for 7, 30 or 90 days from its drawer.

Rights

Every member of the organisation can see the list and add domains. Changing, checking or deleting a domain is for the organisation owner or an admin, or whoever added that domain; other members see it read-only. Alert settings and Check all now are owner / admin only. Every change is recorded in the activity log.

4 · The canvas node

What the node shows

A Domain Expiry source reads the Domains list; it never queries a registry itself. It shows the soonest expiry, the counts per level and up to 200 domains, and turns the node amber or red from the Domains levels (or from its own warn / critical days, which only change the colour).

• Pick All domains, one group, or Ungrouped only — groups come from the Domains page, so a team can have a node for its own domains.
• No duplicate alerts: the node never sends an alert of its own. Domain alerts come only from the Domains page settings, once per domain, however many nodes show it.
• The integration is tied to the organisation it was created in; it only ever shows that organisation's domains.

Good to know

• Lookups run on the Topologix server. On-premises installs need outbound HTTPS and TCP/43; the cloud service has both.
• Some registries never close the WHOIS connection after answering (whois.nic.ge is one); Topologix stops reading at the registry's terms footer or after a short silence, so those checks don't hang.
• Dates are kept to the day. A registry that publishes a local time (dns.pl writes renewal date: 2028.02.04 12:17:07) is read as that day.
• The registrable-domain folding uses a short built-in list of second-level suffixes (co.uk, com.ge, com.au …). The preview shows every fold, so check it for rare suffixes before you apply.