Re: radical suggestion

[Jacob Palme <[e-mail]>]

At 13:14 -0700 02-09-14, Russ Allbery wrote:
>It's really frustrating to try to code to an amended standard.  The W3C
>does this from time to time, and I find it almost impossible to keep track
>of what the *real* standard is without actually printing out the original
>standard and then going through the amendments and noting them on the
>printout by hand.

This is a problem with the way IETF standards are
published - as RFCs which cannot be modified except
by publication of a new RFC. And then the new RFC
does not really cause any change in the text of
the amended RFC.

Note that the RFC index sometimes includes phrases
like (Obsoletes RFC2543), (Updated by RFC3265) or
(Status: Historic).

Perhaps this text in the RFC index should also
be copied into the heading of the RFC itself?

Does the heading of an RFC really contain
for example "Status: Draft standard" for a document
which is in reality "Historic"? If so, is this
right? If not, then the original text of an RFC
can in reality be changed after publication!
-- 
Jacob Palme <[e-mail]> (Stockholm University and KTH)
for more info see URL: http://www.dsv.su.se/jpalme/