Re: PS Characterization Clarified

[Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail]>]

Hi Jari,

On 03/09/2013 02:23, Jari Arkko wrote:

...
> At the time of this writing, the IETF operates as if the
> Proposed Standard was the last chance for the to ensure the
> quality of the technology and the clarity of the standards
> document.  

There's a point that I think should be made here, something like:

In practice, interoperable implementations are commonly based on
Proposed Standard documents, so whatever design defects those
documents have tend to become part of the interoperable network,
perhaps in the form of work-arounds. Similarly, in today's
Internet, any security defects tend to be exploited at an early
stage. Fixing design and security issues in widely deployed code
may be difficult or impossible in practice. Therefore, there is
now very strong pressure to make the Proposed Standard as mature
as possible, rather than being just good enough to meet the RFC
2026 requirements.

> The result is that IETF Proposed Standards 
> approved over the last decade or more have had extensive
> review. 

Exactly.

   Brian