Re: [apps-discuss] "X-" revisited

[Ben Niven-Jenkins <[e-mail]>]

Dave,

On 27 Jun 2011, at 22:29, Dave CROCKER wrote:
> On 6/27/2011 2:21 PM, Ben Niven-Jenkins wrote:
>> Is the guidance aimed only at documents produced within the IETF or is the intention that it is more general guidance. For example is it saying that someone defining a private extension that they do not intend to (at least initially) to bring to the IETF should still avoid use of "X-" because forseeing the future is hard and although at definition time they do not intend to standardise it, at some future point that might happen and it could cause the interoperability problems outlined in the draft?
> 
> 
> It can't be only for documents within the IETF.
> 
> The entire purpose of the X- construct, when we first introduced it in RFC822, was to support /private/ activities.
> 
> It defined a safe haven for that private work, within a naming structure defined by the equivalent of the IETF.  But 'private' means outside the IETF.
> 
> What motivates the current document is that 'safe haven' turns out not to be nearly as important as making it easier to take the private efforts that have become popular and make then standardized, with the minimum transition pain.

That's what I thought based on the initial sections of the document but the wording of the final guidance is such that it wasn't clear what was actually being recommended. I'd suggest changing the language to make it clear to non-IETF regulars that the guidance is wider than just documents produced by the IETF.

It was the use of "produced within the IETF" that got me confused, so maybe drop it and just have "Therefore, this document recommends against the creation of new names with the special "X-" prefix in application protocols"?

Ben