Re: [rfc-i] getting SVG of RFC diagrams

[Carsten Bormann <[e-mail]>]

On 2023-11-27, at 18:21, Paul Kyzivat <[e-mail]> wrote:
> 
> My interest came from working on a bunch of sip documents that define syntax using ABNF. The core defining document for sip is RFC3261. Its ABNF is large self contained except it uses the ABNF core rules. It references SDP (RFC237) but their syntax is independent. There are quite a lot of follow on documents that extend and revise RFC3261 and/or RFC2327. Many of those contain new ABNF describing their extension as an addition/revision of the ABNF in prior documents.

I have a slightly different approach here.

Generally, FDT that we find in older RFCs is not fully usable out of the box.
Some assembly may be required, as you mention.
There also may be some need for fixing, completing, or bundling.
(A typical example for the need of intervention is the use of prose <…> in ABNF.)

So, for CDDL, I started writing a draft motivated by my own use, draft-bormann-cbor-rfc-cddl-models.
This picks up a few pieces of CDDL from RFCs and makes it available in a more palatable form.
Obviously, this needs more work, but it already helps as it is.

Clearly a community effort, but one that could be made more useful without a lot of process needed.

YANG has a much stronger culture of checking the FDT models before publication.  (The recently pointed out XPath problems notwithstanding.)

BTW, some interesting data:
13 post-8650 RFCs have SVG, 108 active I-Ds.  
SVG is clearly on an upwards trend.
69 post-8650 RFCs have ABNF, 43 active I-Ds that we have the XML for.  
ABNF appears to be well-established and in active development.
29 post-8650 RFCs have CDDL, 55 active I-Ds that we have the XML for.  
CDDL also is seeing an upwards trend.
58 post-8650 RFCs have YANG, 37 active I-Ds that we have the XML for.  
YANG also is well-established.

(Of course, this quick check only was counting properly identified ABNF or CDDL.  The post-8650 RFCs span four years of activity now, the active I-Ds 0.5 years, but of course many of these have earlier revisions and do replace even older drafts.)

Grüße, Carsten