Network Working Group H. Alvestrand Internet-Draft E. Lear Updates: 2026 (if approved) Cisco Systems Expires: September 24, 2004 March 26, 2004 Moving documents to Historic: A procedure draft-alvestrand-newtrk-historical-00.txt Status of this Memo This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress." The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at http:// www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt. The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html. This Internet-Draft will expire on September 24, 2004. Copyright Notice Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004). All Rights Reserved. Abstract This document describes a procedure for performing the downgrading of old Proposed and Draft standards described in RFC 2026 without placing an unreasonable load on groups charged with performing other tasks in the IETF. It defines a new group, called the "Commission for Protocol Obsolesence", which shall recommend to the IESG downgrading or progressing documents on the IETF standards track. Ultimate decisions still rest of with the IESG, with appeal to the IAB. 1. Introduction and history Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 1] Internet-Draft Moving To Historic March 2004 RFC 2026, and RFC 1602 before it, specified timelines for review of immature (draft or proposed) standards. The purpose of such review was to determine whether such documents should be advanced, retired, or developed further.[1] This procedure has never been followed in the history of the IETF. Since this procedure has not been followed, members of the community have suggested that the retiring of a document to Historic is a significant event, which should be justified carefully - leading to the production of documents such as RFC 2556 (OSI connectionless transport services on top of UDP Applicability Statement for Historic Status) and RFC 3166 (Request to Move RFC 1433 to Historic Status). Such documents require significant time and effort on the part of authors, area directors, and the RFC Editor. Indeed such effort should be reserved for advancing or maintaining immature standards. Hence, no document should be required for an immature standard to be retired to Historic status. 2. New Decommissioning Procedure The decommissioning procedure for standards has the following steps: o The Commission determines that a set of documents is eligible for reclassification as Historic according to RFC 2026. It's up to the Commission to decide which documents to tackle next. o The Commission attempts to find out whether there are mailing lists or contactable individuals relevant to the technology described in the documents. o For each standard in question, the Commission sends out a message to the IETF list and the lists deemed relevant, asking for implementation experience and active usage. o If there are reports of implementation experience and/or active usage, the RFC is moved into the Commission's Individual Decommissioning Procedure. o The Commission sends to the IESG the remaining list of documents it recommends be reclassified as Historic along with a record of steps taken to identify that standard's use. That record should include pointers to archives, as well as a log of actions taken to seek out usage. o The IESG will respond to the Commission's recommendation with a message to the IETF Announce list. If it agrees to the change in status, the standard is marked Historic. It may also request more Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 2] Internet-Draft Moving To Historic March 2004 information from the Commission or outright disagree. 3. Individual Decommissioning Procedure This procedure is intended for use when one needs to consider evidence before deciding what to do with a document. Because of the time that has passed without applying the 2026 rule, this document describes three alternatives, not two: o Maintenance on the standards track (per 2026) o Reclassification as Historic (per 2026) o Reclassification as Informational.(XXX Do we require a new classification?) Maintenance on the standards track at this point demands attention from the IETF if a document is not full standard. Such a document should either be advanced by the IESG, or a working group should be formed to address its shortcomings. The last alternative is intended for cases where the technology is in active use, perhaps in a small community, and it is clearly not reasonable to expect it to advance on the standards track. (XXX DRAFT NOTE: Cannot a small community continue to use a Historic standard, such as, oh, SNMPv1?) 3.1 Procedure The Commission takes input from all sources it cares to take input from. As it does so it will keep an archive and a record of all such input. Once it determines a recommended action, it sends a recommendation to the IESG along with a pointer to the record, and the IESG will announce this to the IETF community if it agrees with the recommendation. 3.2 Evaluation criteria The decision on when to ask for reclassification is made by the Commission. Criteria that should be considered are: o Implementations. A spec that is unimplemented should go to Historic. o Usage. A protocol or feature that is completely unused should go to Historic. A protocol or feature that is used, and found useful, Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 3] Internet-Draft Moving To Historic March 2004 but only in limited circumstances, should go Informational. XXX o Potential for harm. A protocol or feature that has been shown to create opeational problems that clearly outstrip its benefits should go to Historic even if there is some usage of it. RFC 1137 - "Mapping between full RFC 822 and RFC 822 with restricted encoding" - was reclassified for that reason. o Interest in further work. If there is a reasonable expectation that the specification will be updated or advanced within a reasonable timeframe, the Commission should do nothing. 4. Selection of the Commission NOTE IN DRAFT: This is intended to be simple, and convey the idea that signing up for this is an 1-year stint, not a permanent position. The IESG will send out a call for volunteers for the Commission once a year, and will choose from the volunteers. A current member of the Commission may volunteer again if he/she wants to. The IESG will appoint as many members to the commission as it deems appropriate, along with a chair. The chair will report every six months via electronic mail to the IETF Announce mailing list on the Commission's progress. The Commission otherwise organizes its own work. The IESG may cut short the term of the commission and send out a new call for volunteers if it finds that reasonable. Normative References [1] Bradner, S., "The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 3", BCP 9, RFC 2026, October 1996. Authors' Addresses Harald Tveit Alvestrand Cisco Systems Weidemanns vei 27 Trondheim 7043 NO EMail: harald@alvestrand.no Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 4] Internet-Draft Moving To Historic March 2004 Eliot Lear Cisco Systems 170 W. Tasman Dr. San Jose, CA 95134 US Phone: +1 408 527 4020 EMail: lear@cisco.com Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 5] Internet-Draft Moving To Historic March 2004 Intellectual Property Statement The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any intellectual property or other rights that might be claimed to pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in this document or the extent to which any license under such rights might or might not be available; neither does it represent that it has made any effort to identify any such rights. Information on the IETF's procedures with respect to rights in standards-track and standards-related documentation can be found in BCP-11. 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This document and the information contained herein is provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 6] Internet-Draft Moving To Historic March 2004 HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Acknowledgment Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the Internet Society. Alvestrand & Lear Expires September 24, 2004 [Page 7]