]>

daigle@isoc.org, leslie@thinkingcat.com

olaf@nlnetlabs.nl

Internet Architecture Board

iab@iab.org

RFC documents contain a number of fixed elements such as the title page header, standard boilerplates and copyright/IPR statements. This document describes them and introduces some updates to reflect current usage and requirements of RFC publication. In particular, this updated structure is intended to communicate clearly the source of RFC creation and review.

Previously RFCs (e.g. ) contained a number of elements that were there for historical, practical, and legal reasons. They also contained boilerplate material to clearly indicate the status of the document and possibly contained "Notes" to indicate how the document interacts with IETF standard track documents. As the RFC Series has evolved over the years, there has been increasing concern over appropriate labelling of the publications to make clear the status of each RFC and the status of the work it describes. Chiefly, there is a requirement that RFCs published as part of the IETF's review process not be easily confused with RFCs that may have had a very different review and approval process. Various adjustments have been made over the years, including evolving text of "Notes" included in the published RFC. With the definition of the different RFC streams it is appropriate to formalize the definition of the various pieces of standard RFC boilerplate and introduce some adjustments to ensure better clarity of expression of document status, aligned with the review and approval processes defined for each stream. This memo identifies and describes the common elements of RFC boilerplate structure, and provides a comprehensive approach to updating and using those elements to communicate, with clarity, RFC document and content status. Most of the historical structure information is collected from . The changes introduced by this memo should be implemented as soon as practically possible after the document has been approved for publication.

Users of RFCs should be aware that while all Internet standards-related documents are published as RFCs, not all RFCs are Internet standards-related documents. The IETF is responsible for maintaining the Internet Standards Process, which includes the requirements for developing, reviewing and approving Standards Track and BCP RFCs. These, and any other standards-related documents (Informational or Experimental) are reviewed by appropriate IETF bodies and published as part of the IETF Stream. Documents published in streams other than the IETF Stream are not reviewed by the IETF for such things as security, congestion control, or inappropriate interaction with deployed protocols. They have also not been subject to IESG approval, including an IETF-wide last call. Therefore, the IETF disclaims, for any of the non-IETF Stream documents, any knowledge of the fitness of those RFCs for any purpose. Refer to , , and and their successors for current details of IETF process and RFC streams.

An RFC title page header can be described as follows:

------------------------------------------------------------------------ <document source> <author name> Request for Comments: <RFC number> [<author affiliation>] [<subseries ID> <subseries number>] [more author info as appropriate] [<RFC relation>:<RFC number[s]>] Category: <category> <month year> ------------------------------------------------------------------------

For example, a sample earlier RFC header is as follows:

------------------------------------------------------------------------ Network Working Group T. Dierks Request for Comments: 4346 Independent Obsoletes: 2246 E. Rescorla Category: Standards Track RTFM, Inc. April 2006 ------------------------------------------------------------------------

The right column contains author name and affiliation information as well as RFC publication date. Conventions and restrictions for these elements are described in RFC style norms and some individual stream definitions. This section is primarily concerned with the information in the left column: This describes the area where the work originates. Historically, all RFCs were labeled Network Working Group. "Network Working Group" refers to the original version of today's IETF when people from the original set of ARPANET sites and whomever else was interested -- the meetings were open -- got together to discuss, design and document proposed protocols. Here, we obsolete the term "Network Working Group" in order to indicate the originating stream. The <document source> is the name of the RFC stream, as defined in and its successors. At the time of this publication, the streams, and therefore the possible entries are: Internet Engineering Task Force Internet Architecture Board Internet Research Task Force Independent This indicates the RFC number, assigned by the RFC Editor upon publication of the document. This element is unchanged. Some document categories are also labeled as a subseries of RFCs. These elements appear as appropriate for such categories, indicating the subseries and the documents number within that series. Currently, there are subseries for BCPs, STDs and FYIs. These subseries numbers may appear in several RFCs. For example, when a new RFC updates an old one, the same subseries number is used. Also, several RFCs may be assigned the same subseries number: a single STD, for example, may be composed of several RFCs, each of which will bear the same STD number. This element is unchanged. Some relations between RFCs in the series are explicitly noted in the RFC header. For example, a new RFC may update one or more earlier RFCs. Currently two relationships are defined "Updates" and "Obsoletes". Other types of relations may be defined elsewhere. This indicates the RFC document category of the publication. These are defined in . Currently, this is always one of: Standards Track, Best Current Practice, Experimental, Informational, or Historic. This element is unchanged.

The "Status of This Memo" describes the category of the RFC, including the distribution statement. This text is included irrespective of the source stream of the RFC. From now on, the "Status of This Memo" will start with a single line describing the status. It will also include a statement describing the stream-specific review of the material (which is stream-dependent). This is an important component of status, insofar as it clarifies the breadth and depth of review, and gives the reader an understanding of how to consider its content. The first paragraph of the Status of this Memo section contains a single line, clearly standing out. It depends on the category of the document. This memo is an Internet Standards Track document. This memo documents an Internet Best Current Practice This memo is not an Internet Standards Track specifiation, <it is published for other purposes>. For Informational, Experimental and other future categories of RFC editor will maintain an appropriate text for <it is published for other purposes>. For example, with an Informational document this could read "It is published for informational purposes". This indicates the RFC number, assigned by the RFC Editor upon publication of the document. This element is unchanged. The second paragraph contains category-specific text as follows: "This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the Internet community. Please see the "Updates to the RFC" section of this document for information on where to find the status of this protocol and the availability of errata for this memo." "This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the Internet Community. Please see the "Updates to the RFC" section of this document for information on where to find the status of this protocol and the availability of errata for this memo." "This memo defines an Experimental Protocol for the Internet community. This memo does not specify an Internet standard of any kind. Discussion and suggestions for improvement are requested." "This memo provides information for the Internet community. This memo does not specify an Internet standard of any kind. " The third paragraph of the "Status of This Memo" will now include a paragraph describing the type of review and exposure the document has received. This is defined on a per-stream basis. From now on, these paragraphs will be defined as part of RFC stream definition. The following texts may be updated if the stream definitions are updated, but initial paragraphs for the existing streams are: "This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). " If there has been an IETF consensus call per IETF process, an additional sentence should be added: "This document represents a consensus of the IETF community. It has received public review and has been approved for publication by the IESG." "This document is a product of the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), and represents information that the IAB has deemed valuable to provide for permanent record. This document has been approved for publication by the IAB and is therefore not a candidate for any level of Internet Standard; see section of RFCXXXX." "This document is a product of the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF). The IRTF publishes the results of Internet-related research and development activities. These results might not be suitable for deployment. This document has been approved for publication by the IRSG. It is not a product of the IETF and is therefore not a candidate for any level of Internet Standard; see section of RFCXXXX." In addition a sentence indicating the consensus base within the IRTF may be added: "This RFC represents the consensus of the <insert_name> Research Group of the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF)." or alternatively "This RFC represents the individual opinion(s) of one or more members of the <insert_name> Research Group of the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF)". "This document is a contribution to the RFC Series, independently of any other RFC stream. The RFC Editor has chosen to publish this document at its discretion and makes no statement about its value for implementation or deployment. It is therefore not a candidate for any level of Internet Standard; see section of RFCXXXX."

Exceptionally, a review and publication process may prescribe additional notes that will appear as labelled notes after the "Status of This Memo". While this has been a common feature of recent RFCs, it is the goal of this exercise to make the overall RFC structure adequately clear to remove the need for such notes, or at least make their usage truly exceptional.

RFCs contain other structural informational elements. The RFC Editor is responsible for the positioning and layout of these structural element. Note also that new elements may be introduced or obsoleted using a process consistent with . These additions may or may not require documentation in an RFC. Currently the following structural information is available in RFCs. A copyright notice with a reference to BCP78 and an Intellectual Property statement referring to BCP78 and BCP79. The content of these statements are defined by those BCPs. The International Standard Serial Number: ISSN 2070-1721. The ISSN uniquely identifies the RFC series as title regardless of language or country in which published. The ISSN itself has no significance other than the unique identification of a serial publication. A reference identifying where more information about the document can be found. This includes information wether the RFC has been updated, obsoleted, or clarified, a listing of possible errata, and information on how to submit errata as described in .

This document tries to clarify the descriptions of the status of an RFC. Misunderstanding the status of a memo could cause interoperability problems, hence security and stability problems.

None.

The RFC Editor is responsibile for maintaining the consistency of the RFC series. To that end the RFC Editor maintains a style manual [insert reference]. In this memo we mention a few explicit structural elements that the RFC editor needs to maintain. The conventions for the content and use of all current and future elements are to be documented in the style manual. [The rest of this section contains specific instructions towards editing this document and can be removed before publication] The documents has two sections, including this one that need to be removed before publication as an RFC. This one and . This memo introduces a number of modifications that will have to be implemented in various tools, such as the xml2rfc tool, the nit tracker and the rfc-erratum portal. The number "XXXX" is to be replaced with RFC number of this memo.

Harvard University

1350 Mass. Ave. Cambridge MA 02138 US +1 617 495 3864 sob@harvard.edu

This memo documents the process used by the Internet community for the standardization of protocols and procedures. It defines the stages in the standardization process, the requirements for moving a document between stages and the types of documents used during this process. It also addresses the intellectual property rights and copyright issues associated with the standards process. This document describes the procedures used by the IESG for handling documents submitted for RFC publication on the Independent and IRTF streams. This document updates procedures described in RFC 2026 and RFC 3710. Technical Committee ISO/TC 46, Information and documentation, Subcommittee SC 9, Identification and description. University California Los Angeles (UCLA) The Network Working Group seems to consist of Steve Carr of Utah, Jeff Rulifson and Bill Duvall at SRI, and Steve Crocker and Gerard Deloche at UCLA. Membership is not closed. The Network Working Group (NWG) is concerned with the HOST software, the strategies for using the network, and initial experiments with the network. Documentation of the NWG's effort is through notes such as this. Notes may be produced at any site by anybody and included in this series. USC/Information Sciences Institute

4676 Admiralty Way Marina del Rey CA 90292 +1 310-822-1511 +1 310-823-6714 Postel@ISI.EDU

USC/Information Sciences Institute

4676 Admiralty Way Marina del Rey CA 90292 +1 310-822-1511 +1 310-823-6714 jkrey@isi.edu

General RFC authors Invisible Worlds, Inc.

660 York Street San Francisco CA 94110 US +1 415 695 3975 mrose@not.invisible.net http://invisible.net/

General RFC Request for Comments I-D Internet-Draft XML Extensible Markup Language This memo presents a technique for using XML (Extensible Markup Language) as a source format for documents in the Internet-Drafts (I-Ds) and Request for Comments (RFC) series. The IETF policies about rights in Contributions to the IETF are designed to ensure that such Contributions can be made available to the IETF and Internet communities while permitting the authors to retain as many rights as possible. This memo details the IETF policies on rights in Contributions to the IETF. It also describes the objectives that the policies are designed to meet. This memo updates RFC 2026, and, with RFC 3979, replaces Section 10 of RFC 2026. This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the Internet Community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. Internet Architecture Board This document describes the framework for an RFC Series and an RFC Editor function that incorporate the principles of organized community involvement and accountability that has become necessary as the Internet technical community has grown, thereby enabling the RFC Series to continue to fulfill its mandate. This memo provides information for the Internet community. This document describes a web-based process for handling the submission, verification, and posting of errata for the RFC Series. The main concepts behind this process are (1) distributing the responsibility for verification to the appropriate organization or person for each RFC stream, and (2) using a Web portal to automate the book-keeping for handling errata.

Thanks to Bob Braden, Brian Carpenter, Steve Crocker and John Klensin who provided background information and inspiration. Various people have made suggestions that improved the document. Among them are: Loa Andersson, Lars Eggert, Alfred Hines, Russ Housley, and David Oran. This document was produced using the xml2rfc tool .

[To Be Removed before publication]

Fixed the header so it appropriatly shows that the document updates RFC 4844, 2223. And added a link to 3932-bis that should appear in tandem with this publication. Introduced the "Other structural information in RFCs" section and moved the ISSN number from the front matter to this section. The "Other structural information in RFCs" intends to give very rough guidance providing the RFC editor with sufficient freedom to move pieces around and edit them to please the eye and mind. Modified the last sentence 3rd paragraph of the Status of this memo section for the IRTF Stream in accordance to a suggestion by Aaron Falk; Indicating that review happend by the IRSG and not indicating that review did not happen by the IESG. Introduced the square brackets around the <author affiliation> in the header. To highlight this is an optional elelment. The definition of the "Clarifies" relation has been taken out. There are arguments that introducing the relation needs a bit more thought and is better done by a seperate document. Provided the RFC Editor with responsibility to maintain several text pieces. In some modifications were applied to the text. The <discription> contains the full name of the stream. RFC2223 and 4844 moved to the informative reference section. Although I am not sure if those are not normative. Guidance!!!

Does the RFC Editor wants to supply text with respect to the level of review in for the Independent Stream?