Re: Working documents repository

[Henning Schulzrinne <schulzrinne at cs.columbia.edu>]

The IETF already archives other records of progress, such as the IETF
proceedings (slides), email to working group lists and working group
meetings, even though almost all of these are no longer current by the
time the RFC is published. It seems that as long as expired I-Ds are
treated just like working group minutes or emails, reflecting a state of
mind of the authors at a certain point, they can be moderately useful.
(The working group minutes or mailing list also don't make a whole lot
of sense without access to the I-D being discussed at the time.)

One of the things that has made access to old I-Ds more of an issue is
that many papers now cite, as work in progress, Internet drafts.
Diligent authors don't have a choice - in most cases, the technical
material is not yet available as an RFC or as a paper, so to give proper
credit or provide context, they have to cite an I-D, which may no longer
be available by the time the paper is published or read.

Having a non-IETF organization provide this access underscores their
unofficial nature, as does the permanent front matter and the date on
the I-D.

Henning
-- 
Henning Schulzrinne   http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~hgs