Re: [arcmedia] [apps-discuss] Proposed charter for arcmedia

[Dave Crocker <[e-mail]>]

The proffered text is all reasonable, but it needs a small bit of
enhancement, for broader readership and a bit of IETF formality:

I suggest adding an opening sentence that sets the context a little
more.  Something like:

   Archive formats are used to aggregate multiple files and other data
into a single object, often with data compression and/or confidentiality
protection (encryption).


> There has been recent work to register media types for archive
> formats such as “tar” (a POSIX standard format).  There are already
> several similar media types for archive formats, such as “gzip” and
> “zip” (see, for example, RFC6713), all of which are registered under
> the top-level media type “application”.

In order for the first paragraph to be able to stand alone, per formal
IETF requirements -- that paragraph is circulated as a description of
the intended effort -- I suggest moving some text to be its last sentence:

   This working group will create an “archive” top-level media type.


> 
> We create top-level media types only rarely, only with Standards
> Track RFCs, and only when one or more media types get special (or
> common, in the case of more than one) handling that does not fit
> under an existing top-level media type.  RFC6838 defines this
> process.
> 
> This working group will create an “archive” top-level media type in a
> Standards Track document, using draft-seantek-kerwin-arcmedia-type as

Replace this sentence with:

   The working group will use draft-seantek-kerwin-arcmedia-type as
initial input.

(It doesn't help the charter to cite intended status.)


> its initial input.  It will specify rules for registering subtypes
> under that new top-level type.  All of the usual things will be
> considered, including type suffixes, fragment identifiers, and
> internationalization.

Replace sentence with:

    The rules will at least include consideration of type suffixes,
fragment identifiers, and internationalization.


> Either in that same document or in a second one, it will produce an
> initial set of registrations under the new top-level media type.
> 
> The main document will include an Implementation Status section,
> described by RFC6982, to record known projects that will either
> produce or consume content using the new media type.  If by the first
> milestone there appears to be no implementations of the new media
> type expected, the working group will fold having produced no RFCs.
> 
> No other work is in scope for this working group.
> 
> Milestones: - June 2015: Base document - December 2015: Registrations
> document (if separate)


d/

-- 
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net