Re: Status of RFC 20

["Heather Flanagan (RFC Series Editor)" <[e-mail]>]

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On 12/8/14 9:09 PM, Nico Williams wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 07, 2014 at 05:13:57PM -0500, John C Klensin wrote:
>> --On Sunday, December 07, 2014 13:47 -0800 joel jaeggli
>> <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>> Anyone raising downref issues with rfc 20 is out of their mind.
>>
>> There we agree, [...]
>
> +1, and +1 to moving RFC20 to Standard.
>
>>> that said you'll note a rather large gap in citations, given
>>> that for something like 29 of the last 45 years there wasn't
>>> an online copy in the rfc repository.
>>
>> (I added Heather to the distribute because of the above)
>>
>> To the best of my knowledge, there has _never_ been a
>> requirement that cited documents be available online, and
>> especially that authoritative copies be available online.
>
> But perhaps there should be one as to new RFCs.  We mind (or should) our
> copyright business nowadays so as to ensure such availability.  That
> isn't enough to ensure the existence of an online archive, but then the
> IETF and the RFC-Editor seem to strive to provide one (I should, but
> don't, know whether and which RFC provides for that function, but if
> there is none, that seems like a rather funny omission).

I'm not sure if you're referring to just RFCs or all cited documents? 
In case of the latter, we do check to see when a URI is offered in the
reference whether or not that URI is valid and points to as stable a
place as is practicable.  But I don't see the RFC Editor ever
_requiring_ cited documents to be online.  For one thing, that's not
entirely my call, as it involves the content of the document as approved
by the IESG, IRSG, IAB, or ISE.  I define the format for the reference,
but reject a reference because it doesn't have a URI?  Not so much.  And
for another thing, I wouldn't do that even if I could.  It's a bad idea
given the inherent instability of the web; not all things stay online
forever.

If you're talking about making sure every single RFC is online and
cite-able as such, I point everyone to the RFC Online Project
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc-online-2000.html>.  As for all RFCs
published in the last 27 years, we already do that.


>
>
>> Certainly it is preferred for many reasons, but never has it
>> been a rule, nor is there a rule that makes RFCs special in that
>> regard.  If the IESG asked the community for permission to
>
> This is certainly true.  We can't really require that external documents
> referenced from RFCs be archived online.

Indeed.  It has been discussed in the past, but that's rather an
enormous job that probably doesn't provide enough value to justify the
costs of storage, backups, and the legal advice that we'd need to do it
properly.

>
>> impose such a rule, it certainly was not within my memory.  As
>> to the "last 45 years", there simply has not been an online
>> repository for that long, so that criticism would apply to any
>> older RFC.
>
>> If we want to start inventing new rules about citations to block
>> progress, I think there are any number of members of the
>> community who would be happy to contribute to the effort.  More
>> constructively, April 1 will be here soon.  :-(
>
> We shouldn't invent new rules, no, but this seems like a nice place to
> segway into proposing a new rule as to online availability of new RFCs.
>
> Nico

- -Heather
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