Re: [Last-Call] Last Call: Advancing the Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP) to Internet Standard

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

Hi.

Questions about this that may bear some discussion (I'm not
necessarily opposed, just think we should be clear)...

The description in the supporting document indicates, as
required, "widespread deployment and successful operational
experience".   While I understand that this has been implemented
for many TLD and address registries and is in use by at least
some of those registries and their customers, RFC 7480, which
appears to be the core document of the collection, says:

"RDAP is a successor protocol to the very old WHOIS protocol."
in the abstract and proceeds to justify the specification of
RDAP in the Introduction and elsewhere in the document.  It is
now nearly seven years since RFC 7480 was published; WHOIS is
almost certainly more in use than ever (just because the
Internet and number of TLDs has grown); and there are continuing
efforts outside the IETF (e.g., in a seemingly-never-ending
sequence of ICANN committees and working groups) to define a
replacement for WHOIS and requirements for its use (at least for
DNS purposes).

So, three questions and a comment, with the understanding that
they may partially apply to 7482bis and 7483bis as well:

(1) While the requirements for Internet Standard do not require
acceptance in the marketplace, I believe the IETF has sometimes
interpreted evidence of the lack of such acceptance --which, at
least in terms of replacing WHOIS for DMS use, appears clear
here-- as an indication that we should not proceed with
advancing the document.  There may be reasons for advancing
these specifications anyway, but would it then be useful to
modify at least 7480 to make the relationships more clear?

(2) More basically, is there consensus in the IETF community
(not just in the regional and TLD registry communities) that
this is the way to go, doing so without any supporting or
explanatory documentation in the RFC Series, noting in
particular that RFC 3912 (the current Whois spec) is already at
Draft Standard and evidently much more widely deployed and used
and that these documents do nothing to deprecate it (the
comments in assorted SSAC reports referenced from RFC 7480 and
many subsequent ICANN reports about its deficiencies
notwithstanding).

(3) If there is actually IETF consensus to advance these two
documents without either updates or supplemental explanations,
could the supporting document in the datatracker, be updated to
reflect discussion and decisions related to the above issues
rather than simply asserting that "the RFC 6410 requirements...
have been met" which, given at least the Whois question, may be
a bit misleading even if that was not intended?

(4) Finally, if the intention of moving these documents to
Internet Standard at this time is, even partially, to act as a
forcing function for getting rid of WHOIS, can that please be
explicit rather than having people asking "why now" questions.
>From my perspective, if it is just a matter of an outgoing AD
trying to clean up as many loose end as possible, I have no
problem with that, but it would be good to be clear.

   thanks,
      john






--On Wednesday, February 10, 2021 11:46 -0800 The IESG
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> 
> The IESG has received a request from the REGEXT working group
> to make the following status changes:
> 
> - RFC7480 from Proposed Standard to Internet Standard
>     (HTTP Usage in the Registration Data Access Protocol
> (RDAP))
> 
> - RFC璁RFC  from Proposed Standard to Internet Standard
>     (Security Services for the Registration Data Access
> Protocol (RDAP))
> 
> The supporting document for this request can be found here:
> 
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/status-change-rdap-to-interne
> t-standard/
> 
> The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and
> solicits final comments on this action. Please send
> substantive comments to the [e-mail] mailing lists
> by 2021-02-24. Exceptionally, comments may be sent to
> [e-mail] instead. In either case, please retain the
> beginning of the Subject line to allow automated sorting.
> 
> The affected documents can be obtained via
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc7480/
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/rfc7481/
> 
> IESG discussion of this request can be tracked via
> https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/status-change-rdap-to-interne
> t-standard/ballot/
> 
> 
> 
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