Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ?
John C Klensin <john-ietf@jck.com> Mon, 26 October 2020 22:06 UTC
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Date: Mon, 26 Oct 2020 18:06:36 -0400
From: John C Klensin <john-ietf@jck.com>
To: Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com>, Toerless Eckert <tte@cs.fau.de>, ietf@ietf.org
cc: wgchairs@ietf.org, rfc-interest@rfc-editor.org, rsoc@iab.org, ietf@johnlevine.com
Subject: Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ?
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References: <20201026020433.GA19475@faui48f.informatik.uni-erlangen.de> <CADaq8je8gMwAkOndTNJ9ndwzOZb2HQMZrCUJ5wNUjw-6ax9QtA@mail.gmail.c om> <35EFE952-7786-4E24-B228-9BEE51D3C876@tzi.org> <20201026150241.GK48111@faui48f.informatik.uni-erlangen.de> <20201026162814.GP39170@kduck.mit.edu> <20201026164036.GO48111@faui48f.informatik.uni-erlangen.de> <1a56dc3b-56ef-3ffb-a12b-44d5e0d0f835@levkowetz.com> <20201026171931.GP48111@faui48f.informatik.uni-erlangen.de> <b733240-fc78-5a71-8920-ff84fbf64287@iecc.com> <20201026180105.GQ48111@faui48f.informatik.uni-erlangen.de> <03976f9f-7f49-7bf7-ce29-ee989232a44d@gmail.com>
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Brian, I look at the same information and come to a different conclusion (quite independent of the question of whether a poll at this point is a useful exercise)... --On Tuesday, October 27, 2020 07:56 +1300 Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com> wrote: > As Julian Reschke observed on the rfc-interest list, since the > new RFC format was implemented: > >> page numbers should not be used to refer to parts of the >> RFC, because page breaks vary with output formats Cross references (and other references) to page numbers have been discouraged since at least RFC 1543 (in 1993) and banned soon after that, to the point that the RFC Editor from the last half of the 1990s would simply remove such references, replace them with references to section numbers, and complain when sections got too long for convenient referencing. Nothing about restricting references to page numbers is new with the new format. > So I can only see confusion if people use page numbers for > any purpose whatever. So it doesn't matter if people want > page numbers; they're now useless. So I won't be answering > a poll, and I don't think the results are interesting. However, getting from "references to information by page numbers have always been a bad idea, prohibited for a quarter-century, and even more obviously a bad idea as we move to multiple formats" to "any purpose whatsoever" is a big jump. At least some of us have tools and macros floating around that are dependent on pagination and, as an exception to the "referencing" rules, it is still not clear (at least to me) how to build and format a document index using anything else (at least without a lot of effort). There are even simple and obvious reasons: If one is going to print an RFC from the text form (or render it into printable form), something is going to do the pagination and being able to easily estimate the page count may affect how printing is to be set up. FWIW, the questions of "should documents be paginated" and "should the pages be numbered" are also separate ones. Moreover, the argument that pagination (and page numbers) are obsolete and useless for RFCs would be much stronger if the PDF form for new RFCs were not paginated (or at least not numbered) ... but it is both paginated and numbered. And, if the issue is having things lay out well on many different types of devices, eliminating pagination (and headers and footers) to facilitate that is bogus: it would be equally or more reasonable to eliminate (or rethink) line breaks in running text, etc. If one really wants things optimally formatted for a variety of different devices, then the right thing to do is to start from the HTML form and a well-designed style sheet or to go back all the way to the XML, not to try fussing with the ASCII text form. Conclusion: The main arguments that have been given for eliminating pagination, headers and footers, and page numbering --at least those based on different devices and references-- are mostly bogus. So, from my point of view as a fan of pagination in the ASCII form of RFCs, one who has never willingly referenced part of an RFC by page number, this seems to come down to something else entirely: if there is a goal to eliminate (or strongly discourage) the use of ASCII format RFCs in favor of the HTML or PDF forms (or building directly on the XML), then "no page numbers" and "no pagination" are among the first few cuts of a death by 1000 of them. If not, this has all of the hallmarks of a gratuitous change to a format that has been useful to many people for a very long time. john p.s. Just in case I'm the anonymous person John Levine's note referred to, I didn't just "not participate" in the discussion. It was made extremely clear that my input was not welcome, so clear that, after a discussion or two with Heather that I should spend my time in other ways. If there were a significant number of others like me (and I have no way to tell, or even to guess) then claims that the no-pagination form represents community consensus lie somewhere on the scale between "dubious" and "bogus".
- Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questions / prefe… Toerless Eckert
- Re: Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questions / p… David Noveck
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Carsten Bormann
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Toerless Eckert
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… David Noveck
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Toerless Eckert
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Benjamin Kaduk
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Toerless Eckert
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Henrik Levkowetz
- John/rsoc: Re: Page numbers in RFCs questions / p… Toerless Eckert
- Re: John/rsoc: Re: Page numbers in RFCs questions… John R. Levine
- Re: John/rsoc: Re: Page numbers in RFCs questions… Robert Sparks
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Carsten Bormann
- Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? (w… Toerless Eckert
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Toerless Eckert
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) … Robert Sparks
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Warren Kumari
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Acee Lindem (acee)
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Brian E Carpenter
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Toerless Eckert
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? John Scudder
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Brian E Carpenter
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Jeffrey Haas
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Carsten Bormann
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Brian E Carpenter
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Benjamin Kaduk
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Wes Hardaker
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Flemming Andreasen
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Henk Birkholz
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Andrew G. Malis
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? John C Klensin
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Henk Birkholz
- Re: [rfc-i] [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFC… Toerless Eckert
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Toerless Eckert
- Re: [rfc-i] [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFC… Wes Hardaker
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Toerless Eckert
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? David Noveck
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Brian E Carpenter
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? John C Klensin
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Toerless Eckert
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Ronald Tse
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? John C Klensin
- Re: Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questions / p… Fred Baker
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Toerless Eckert
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … John C Klensin
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Ronald Tse
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Ronald Tse
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … John C Klensin
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Ronald Tse
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Larry Masinter
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Brian E Carpenter
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Brian E Carpenter
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Keith Drage
- Re: [irsg] [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (… Carsten Bormann
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Paul Kyzivat
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Toerless Eckert
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … HANSEN, TONY L
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Henrik Levkowetz
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … HANSEN, TONY L
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Paul Kyzivat
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Jeffrey Haas
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Henrik Levkowetz
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Toerless Eckert
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Benjamin Kaduk
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Jeffrey Haas
- Re: [irsg] Resending: Page numbers in RFCs questi… Benjamin Kaduk
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … HANSEN, TONY L
- RE: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Andrew Campling
- Re: Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty please) ? Mark Andrews
- Re: [rfc-i] Poll: RFCs with page numbers (pretty … Paul Kyzivat