Re: [dtn] Marking RFC5050 as Obsolete?

[Carsten Bormann <[e-mail]>]

On Sep 23, 2019, at 10:16, [e-mail] <lloyd.wood=[e-mail]> wrote:
> 
> Explicitly obsolete RFC5050? Do you really want to do this?

Yes.

Generally, when experimental protocols are replaced by standards-track protocols, we mark the RFC documenting the experimental protocol as obsoleted by the RFC documenting the standards-track protocol.  E.g., see RFC 3940(*) and RFC 5740.  That, of course, doesn’t mean the *experiment* is “obsolete”, the experiment is done and was a great success, and has led to the standards-track protocol.

The fact that the obsoleted protocol specification was documented in a different process (here, in the IRTF stream) is not really relevant.  Of course, obsoleting the document in the RFC series doesn’t mean that other SDOs (here: CCSDS) magically also consider it obsoleted; that may be work that needs to be done.

I’m CCing the IRTF chair for another opinion on whether there is a problem with a IETF specification obsoleting an experimental IRTF protocol specification.  To me, it is obvious that the DTN WG was set up to do exactly that, and there were a few years to stop this process if this outcome wasn’t desired.

Grüße, Carsten

(*) which came out of an IRTF effort as well, but was completed as an experimental protocol by an IETF working group, so it is not an all-out analog to the situation here.