Re: Last Call: <draft-leiba-cotton-iana-5226bis-12.txt> (Guidelines for Writing an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs) to Best Current Practice

[Stephen Farrell <[e-mail]>]

Hiya,

On 03/06/16 19:45, Barry Leiba wrote:
> Hi, Donald.
> 
>> It is also possible that a code point is being obsoleted by an RFC bis
>> document but is retained in the registry, in which case you want the
>> reference for that value to be to the obsolete RFC where it is
>> specified.
> 
> Ooh, yes, that's certainly correct.  The current text handles that by
> saying "for any registries or registered items that are still in
> current use."
> 
> Would anyone object, and would this address your concern, Stephen, if
> I should change the text like this:
> 
> OLD
>    If information for registered items has been or is being moved to
>    other documents, then, of course, the registration information should
>    be changed to point to those other documents. In no case is it
>    reasonable to leave documentation pointers to the obsoleted document
>    for any registries or registered items that are still in current use.
> NEW
>    If information for registered items has been or is being moved to
>    other documents, then the registration information should be changed
>    to point to those other documents. In most cases, documentation
>    references should not be left pointing to the obsoleted document
>    for registries or registered items that are still in current use.
> END

That is better, but I'm still worried that it'd be used by well meaning
folk to force authors to do more work than is needed for no real gain.

My preferred OLD/NEW would be:

OLD
   If information for registered items has been or is being moved to
   other documents, then, of course, the registration information should
   be changed to point to those other documents. In no case is it
   reasonable to leave documentation pointers to the obsoleted document
   for any registries or registered items that are still in current use.
NEW
   If information for registered items has been or is being moved to
   other documents, then the registration information should be changed
   to point to those other documents. Ensuring that registry entries
   point to the most recent document as their definition is encouraged
   but not necessary as the RFC series meta-data documents the relevant
   relationships (OBSOLETED by etc) so readers will not be misled.
END

> 
> Barry
> 
>