Re: [Gen-art] Genart last call review of draft-kucherawy-rfc8478bis-03

[Yann Collet <[e-mail]>]

> I assume that the "last block" flag is the least significant bit of the first byte of the block header?  

Yes, this is correct

> And Literals_Block_Type is the least significant two bits of the first byte of the Literals_Section_Header?

Yes, this is correct too.

> Should this be stated more explicitly? 

In both cases, the bitfield is preceded by the mention "little-endian" :

- " Block_Header uses 3 bytes, written using little-endian convention. It contains 3 fields "
- Literals_Section_Header: "It's a byte-aligned variable-size bitfield, ranging from 1 to 5 bytes, using little-endian convention."

"Little-endian" was presumed a "good enough" indication that the first byte is the lowest one.
After that, the "lowest bit" becomes the least significant bit of the first byte.

Nevertheless, if this is deemed not clear enough, 
some additional statement could be added to make the specification more explicit.



On 12/26/19, 17:16, "Joel Halpern via Datatracker" <[e-mail]> wrote:

    Reviewer: Joel Halpern
    Review result: Ready
    
    I am the assigned Gen-ART reviewer for this draft. The General Area
    Review Team (Gen-ART) reviews all IETF documents being processed
    by the IESG for the IETF Chair.  Please treat these comments just
    like any other last call comments.
    
    Document: draft-kucherawy-rfc8478bis-03
    Reviewer: Joel Halpern
    Review Date: 2019-12-26
    IETF LC End Date: 2020-01-17
    IESG Telechat date: Not scheduled for a telechat
    
    Summary: This review primarily focused on the differences, which seem
    appropriate, from the RFC.
    
    Major issues: N/A
    
    Minor issues: N/A
    
    Nits/editorial comments:
        I presume that bits within a byte are still interpreted in the normal
        fashions since we do not work in terms of the serialization of bits on a
        wire, and in fact different wires may do it differently.  This does leave
        the question of how bit fields are interpreted when they describe bits
        within a byte.  Thus, I assume that the "last block" flag is the least
        significant bit of the first byte of the block header?  And
        Literals_Block_Type is the least significant two bits of the first byte of
        the Literals_Section_Header?  (I presume that the use of little-endian
        encoding is due to existing practice, and therefore presume it is what this
        needs to describe.)   Should this be stated more explicitly?