The IETF Operational Notes (IONs) experiment has concluded. The IESG has determined that IONs will not be used in the future. It is clear that the IESG, IAB, and IAOC need the ability to publish documents that do not expire and are easily updated. Information published as web pages, including IESG Statements, are sufficient for this purpose. The IESG intends to employ some form of version control so that previous versions of IESG Statements will be available on line.
As specified in RFC 4693, the existing ION documents now have the same status as any other Web page or file on the IETF servers. Accordingly, the IONs that were developed during the experiment will be republished as follows:
The IESG has also recommended that the following documents be republished as IAOC web pages:
The discussion on the appropriate type of document for the ion-discuss- criteria will continue. The decision that this particular ION become an IESG Statement at this point in time is not intended to forecast the outcome of this discussion; rather, it is a fulfillment of the statement in RFC 4693, which says:
If the IESG decides that the feedback warrants terminating the series, the repository will be closed for new documents, and the existing ION documents will be returned to having the same status as any other Web page or file on the IETF servers -- this situation will closely resemble the situation before the experiment started.
Much thanks to the ION authors and the people that provided comments on the experiment.
On behalf of the IESG,
Russ Housley