DropShark 2.0

DropShark Documentation and Information. This documentation is an evolving document. If there are any aspects of DropShark that you feel should be better-explained (or are missing coverage entirely), please drop an email to info@dropshark.com and we'll get it online as quickly as possible.

If you'd like to see the changes made in each version (and each build release), see http://www.dropshark.com/WhatsNew.aspx
Requirements DropShark requires Windows 2000 or Windows XP with the .NET Framework 1.1 installed . If you do not have the .NET Frameworks, you can download it for free from Microsoft's update site at http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com. As DropShark creates many in-memory tables for fast domain searching, a bare minimum of 64 megabytes of RAM is required, and 256 megabytes is strongly recommended. The minimum hardware requirements are a Pentium III computer at 500 Megahertz or faster and a video display resolution of 1024x768. While you may be able to run DropShark on lesser machines, it is not recommended.
Installation Installing DropShark is as simple as unzipping the distribution zip into the directory of your choice, and then running DropShark.exe. Your configuration file will be automatically created. If you have not yet purchased DropShark, it will run in demo mode.
Demo Mode When first installed, DropShark will not have an account associated. Should you not purchase an account immediately, DropShark will be running in demo mode. Demo mode enables all of the search functionality of registered mode, but will only load data for a single day - April 20th, 2004 in fact.
Purchasing and Installing your account Once you have seen the power of DropShark, we are confident that you will agree that it is the most powerful dropping-domain search tool available. To purchase an account, visit http://www.dropshark.com/Purchase.aspx. Your account name will be the email address you use when purchasing your account. Once your account purchase has been confirmed, click the configuration tab and enter your email address in the account box and click the Change Account button. Your account name will be saved in your local configuration file and used on subsequent data loads.
Loading Domain Names Once you have your account loaded (or choose to use DropShark in demo mode), select the date(s) you wish to load and click the "Load Domains" button ("Load Demo" button in demo mode). To select the date(s) you wish to load, check the box(es) next to the date(s) you wish to load. The default load date is today's date. Note that the drop may have already occured, but you can still load today's data. On some occasions, the fifth day of data may not yet be available if Verisign has not yet published it. In this case, the fifth day will show zero domains until Verisign publishes their list.
Searching

Once the domain list is loaded, you can click on the Search tab and the Length tab to access searching functionality.

Under the Search Constraints group, you can select to filter results based on top-level domain, whether or not the domain contains a dash or number, or limit the maximum length of the domain.

In the Length tab, there are pre-configured searches for domains with length of from 2 to 9 characters. These searches will respect the TLD and dash/number restrictions. In the Search tab there are also pre-configured searches for dictionary words and compound words. DropShark uses a lot of RAM in building in-memory tables for these powerful searches. You will find that the compound-word search is clearly the fastest available. The final form of search is "regular expression" searching. Regular expressions are a powerful tool, but can cause searches to take a very long time. A detailed tutorial on regular expressions is in the works.

Manual searching can be for domains that begin with, contain, or end with specific strings. Putting a string in the textbox and clicking Search will perform that search.
Saved Searches

There are, naturally, a number of searches you will wish to perform on every list, every day. For this purpose, DropShark allows you to save searches.

Clicking Save will save a search in your DropShark profile, allowing you to repeat that search on future lists. Clicking Run Saved will run your saved searches, one after the other. You will see the progress bar for each search, and results will be highlighted with different colors to make them easier to differentiate.
Configuration Options

The configuration screen lets you change the way that DropShark operates.

  • You can enable or disable regular expression searching. Regular expressions are a very powerful search language, but can be dangerous if constructed improperly, as they can consume significant processing resources. We will be publishing detailed instructions on regular expressions shortly, and are planning a Regular Expression Builder feature in a future build.
  • You can select the colors for highlighting different days on a 5-day list load.
  • You can enter your account name once you've purchased your license to DropShark, allowing you access to live data.
Selected Domains Selected domains are displayed in the Selected Domains tab. You can use the Selected Domains display to choose which domains you will submit to your drop-catching service of choice as well as perform further operations on selected domains.