RFC 1310

The Internet Standards Process

📅 published March 1992, from ietf

RFC 1310: The Internet Standards Process ✨

Okay bestie, RFC 1310 is literally the one that explains how the internet decides what becomes a standard 🦋 Here's the header tea 🫖: it's from the Network Working Group, written by the Internet Activities Board, with Lyman Chapin as Chair 👑. It's dated March 1992 📅 and it's Informational 🌸, which means it's an informational memo and not a standard itself. The header doesn't list anything it obsoletes or updates, so it's not swapping out or changing any other RFC 💅

Status of this Memo 📋

This informational memo lays out the current procedures for creating and documenting Internet Standards 💖 Distribution of this memo is unlimited 🌈

TABLE OF CONTENTS 📜

   1.  INTRODUCTION .................................................  2
      1.1. Internet Standards .......................................  2
      1.2. Organization .............................................  3
   2.  THE INTERNET STANDARDS PROCESS ...............................  4
      2.1. Introduction .............................................  4
      2.2. The Internet Standards Track .............................  5
      2.3. Requests for Comments (RFCs) .............................  5
      2.4. Internet Drafts ..........................................  6
      2.5. Internet Assigned Number Authority (IANA) ................  7
      2.6. Review and Approval ......................................  8
      2.7. Entering the Standards Track .............................  9
      2.8. Advancing in the Standards Track .........................  9
      2.9. Revising a Standard ...................................... 10
   3.  NOMENCLATURE ................................................. 10
      3.1  Types of Specifications .................................. 10
      3.2  Standards Track Maturity Levels .......................... 12
      3.3  Non-Standards Track Maturity Levels ...................... 13
      3.4  Requirement Levels ....................................... 14
   4.  EXTERNAL STANDARDS AND SPECIFICATIONS ........................ 15
   5.  INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS ................................. 17
   6.  PATENT POLICY ................................................ 17
      6.1  Statement from Patent Holder ............................. 18
      6.2  Record of Statement ...................................... 18
      6.3  Notice ................................................... 18
      6.4  Identifying Patents ...................................... 19
   7.  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND REFERENCES ............................... 19
   APPENDIX A: GLOSSARY ............................................. 20
   APPENDIX B: UNRESOLVED ISSUES .................................... 21
   Security Considerations .......................................... 23
   Author's Address ................................................. 23

1. INTRODUCTION 🌸

1.1. Internet Standards

This memo documents the process currently used to standardize Internet protocols and procedures 💅

The Internet is a loosely-organized international collaboration of autonomous, interconnected networks 🌐 Hosts talk to each other because everyone voluntarily sticks to the open protocols and procedures defined by Internet Standards ✨ There are also lots of isolated internets (sets of interconnected networks) that aren't connected to the Internet but still use the Internet Standards 🧚 The architecture and technical specs came out of about two decades of R&D by the network research community, service and equipment vendors, and government agencies around the world 🌍

In general, an Internet Standard is a specification that is stable and well-understood, is technically competent, has multiple, independent, and interoperable implementations with operational experience, enjoys significant public support, and is recognizably useful in some or all parts of the Internet 💖

The main set of Internet Standards is commonly known as the "TCP/IP protocol suite" 🎀 As the Internet evolves, newer protocols and services, especially those for Open Systems Interconnection (OSI), have been and will be deployed in traditional TCP/IP environments, so the Internet ends up supporting multiple protocol suites 🌸 This document covers all protocols, procedures, and conventions used in the Internet, not just the TCP/IP ones 🫶

The big picture is pretty simple 😌 A specification goes through a period of development and several rounds of review by the Internet community, maybe gets revised based on experience, gets adopted as a Standard by the appropriate body (more on that below), and then gets published.

In practice it's messier 💀 because of (1) the number and type of possible sources for specifications; (2) the need to prepare and revise a specification in a way that preserves the interests of all the affected parties; (3) the importance of getting widespread community agreement on its technical content; and (4) how hard it is to evaluate how useful a particular specification is for the Internet community.

Some candidates for Internet standardization come from organized efforts directly inside the Internet community 🔥 Others started as work that wasn't originally organized as an Internet effort, but later got adopted by the Internet community 🙌

The Internet has always been, and is expected to stay, an evolving system 🌈 Its participants keep factoring new requirements and technology into the design and implementation of the global Internet. Users, and the folks who provide the equipment, software, and services that support it, should expect this adaptability and embrace it as a major tenet of Internet philosophy 🫶

The procedures in this document are the result of three years of evolution, driven by the needs of the growing and increasingly diverse Internet community, and by experience 📚 Comments and suggestions for improving these procedures are invited 💌

1.2. Organization

The Internet Activities Board (IAB) is the primary coordinating committee for Internet design, engineering, and management [1] 👑 The IAB has delegated to its Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) the primary responsibility for developing and reviewing potential Internet Standards from all sources. The IETF forms Working Groups to dig into specific technical issues, which often results in one or more specifications being proposed for adoption as Internet Standards ✨

Final decisions on Internet standardization are made by the IAB, based on recommendations from the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG), the leadership body of the IETF 💅 IETF Working Groups are organized into areas, and each area is coordinated by an Area Director. The Area Directors and the IETF Chairman are included in the IESG 🧚

Anyone in the Internet community with the time and interest is urged to attend IETF meetings and to participate actively in one or more IETF Working Groups 🎀 Participation is by individual technical contributors, not formal representatives of organizations. It works because the Working Groups show a spirit of cooperation as well as a high degree of technical maturity. Most IETF members agree that the biggest benefit for the whole Internet community comes from cooperative development of technically superior protocols and services 💖

A second body under the IAB, the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF), investigates topics that are considered too uncertain, too advanced, or not well-enough understood to be the subject of Internet standardization 🔬 When an IRTF activity produces a specification that's stable enough to be considered for Internet standardization, it gets processed through the IETF 🦋

Section 2 of this document describes the process and rules for Internet standardization 🗺️ Section 3 presents the nomenclature for the different kinds and levels of Internet standard technical specifications and their applicability. Section 4 defines how relevant externally-sponsored specifications and practices, which are developed and controlled by other bodies or by vendors, are handled in the Internet standardization process. Section 5 presents the requirement for prior disclosure of the existence of intellectual property rights. Section 6 describes the rules for Internet Standards that involve patents 🌷

2. THE INTERNET STANDARDS PROCESS 🛤️

2.1. Introduction

The procedures in this document are meant to give a clear, open, and objective basis for developing, evaluating, and adopting Internet Standards for protocols and services 💖 They leave lots of room for participation and comment by all interested parties. Before an Internet Standard gets adopted, it's repeatedly discussed (and maybe debated) in open meetings and/or public electronic mailing lists, and it's available for review through world-wide on-line directories 🌐

These procedures are explicitly aimed at developing and adopting generally-accepted practices 👑 So a candidate for Internet standardization gets implemented and tested for correct operation and interoperability by multiple, independent parties, and gets utilized in increasingly demanding environments, before it can be adopted as an Internet Standard 💪

The procedures give a great deal of flexibility to adapt to the wide variety of circumstances that come up in Internet standardization 🤸 Experience has shown this flexibility is vital for reaching these goals for Internet standardization:

  • high quality ✨
  • prior implementation and testing 🧪
  • openness and fairness 🫶
  • timeliness ⏰

2.2. The Internet Standards Track

Specifications that are destined to become Internet Standards evolve through a set of maturity levels known as the "standards track" 🛤️ These maturity levels, "Proposed Standard", "Draft Standard", and "Standard", are defined and discussed below in Section 3.2 ✨

Even after a specification has been adopted as an Internet Standard, further evolution often happens based on experience and the recognition of new requirements 🔄 The nomenclature and procedures provide for replacing old Internet Standards with new ones, and for assigning descriptive labels to indicate the status of "retired" Internet Standards 🪦 A set of maturity levels is defined in Section 3.3 to cover these and other "off-track" specifications 💅

2.3. Requests for Comments (RFCs)

Each distinct version of a specification is published as part of the "Request for Comments" (RFC) document series 📜

RFCs form a series of publications of networking technical documents, begun in 1969 as part of the original DARPA wide-area networking (ARPANET) project (see Appendix A for glossary of acronyms) 🕰️ They cover a wide range of topics, from early discussion of new research concepts to status memos about the Internet 🧠 The IAB views the RFC publication process as important enough to warrant including the RFC Editor in the IAB membership 👑

2.3. (continued) Let's Get the Tea on Standards ✨

okay so the status of every spec on the Internet standards track gets summarized every so often in a summary RFC called "IAB Official Protocol Standards" [2] 💅 it shows how mature each Internet protocol or service spec is, so you can check what's up 🫶

********************************************************
*   The "IAB Official Protocol Standards" RFC is the   *
*   authoritative statement of the status of any       *
*   particular Internet specification,                 *
********************************************************

and it's the "Publication of Record" for Internet standardization, so it's the one source of truth bestie 👑

the STD documents are a subseries of the RFC series 🎀 when a spec gets adopted as a Standard, its RFC gets labeled with a STDxxx number [9] on top of its RFC number ✨

not every spec for the Internet SHOULD or will become an Internet Standard, and that's totally valid 🥰 non-standards track specs aren't subject to the rules for Internet standardization. they're generally published directly as RFCs at the RFC editor's discretion, and they get marked as "Experimental" or "Informational" (see section 3.3) 🧚

********************************************************
*   It is important to remember that not all RFCs      *
*   are standards track documents, and that not all    *
*   standards track documents reach the level of       *
*   Standard.                                          *
********************************************************

2.4. Internet Drafts ✨

during development, draft versions of the doc get posted for informal review and comment in the IETF's "Internet Drafts" directory, which is replicated on a bunch of Internet hosts 🦋 it's a living working doc that a wide audience can read, which makes review and revision way smoother 💖

once the author and the cognizant Working Group are happy with it, a doc that's expected to enter or advance in the Internet standardization process SHALL be made available as an Internet Draft 🔥 it SHALL stay an Internet Draft for long enough to get useful community review, at least two weeks, before it goes to the IESG 🌸

an Internet Draft that gets published as an RFC is removed from the Internet Draft directory 🙈 and if a doc sits unchanged in that directory for more than six months without the IESG recommending it for publication as an RFC, it's simply removed too 💀 at any time, an Internet Draft MAY be replaced by a newer version of the same spec, which restarts the six-month timeout 🍓

an Internet Draft is NOT a way of "publishing" a spec 🚫 specs get published through the RFC mechanism in the next section. Internet Drafts have no formal status, they're not part of the permanent archival record of Internet activity, and they can change or disappear at any time. under no circumstances SHOULD an Internet Draft be referenced by any paper, report, or Request for Proposal 😭

2.5. Internet Assigned Number Authority (IANA) ✨

lots of protocol specs include numbers, keywords, and other parameters that MUST be uniquely assigned 🔢 think version numbers, protocol numbers, port numbers, and MIB numbers 🧚 the IAB delegated the job of assigning these protocol parameters for the Internet to the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) 👑 the IANA publishes tables of every currently assigned number and parameter in RFCs titled "Assigned Numbers" [8] 📖

each category of assigned numbers usually comes from some protocol that's on the standards track or is an Internet Standard. for example, TCP port numbers get assigned because TCP is a Standard 🫶 a particular value within a category MAY be assigned in a bunch of different situations: the spec requiring the parameter MAY be on the standards track, MAY be Experimental, or MAY be private 💅

chaos could happen from accidental conflicts of parameter values 💀 so we really urge that every protocol parameter, for public or private use, gets explicitly assigned by the IANA. private protocols often become public, and programmers are super tempted to pick a "random" value or guess the next unassigned one. both are hazardous 🙈⚠️

the IANA's job is to avoid frivolous assignments and keep every assignment uniquely distinguishable 🎀 it does this by requiring a technical description of each protocol or service that a value is for. judgment on whether the description is adequate belongs to the IANA 👩‍⚖️ for a standards track or Experimental protocol, the corresponding technical specs provide the REQUIRED documentation for IANA ✨ for a proprietary protocol, the IANA keeps any writeup confidential, but at least a short (2 page) writeup is still REQUIRED for an assignment 🔒

to contact the IANA for info or to request a number, keyword, or parameter assignment, email iana@isi.edu 📩

2.6. Review and Approval ✨

a standards action (entering a spec into the standards track, or advancing it within the track) SHALL be recommended to the appropriate IETF Area Director, or to the Chairman of the IETF, by whoever is responsible for the spec 🎀 usually the recommendation comes from an IETF Working Group 🫶 the Area Director or IETF chairman, working with the IESG, SHALL decide whether an independent technical review of the spec is REQUIRED, and SHALL commission one if necessary 🔍

when a spec is important enough for its potential impact on the Internet or on the suite of Internet protocols, the IESG SHALL form a special review and analysis committee to evaluate it 🧐 that committee exists to give the Internet community an objective basis for agreeing the spec is ready to advance 💜 and when the criteria for advancing an important class of specs (like routing protocols [6]) aren't universally recognized, the IESG SHALL commission the development and publication of category-specific acceptance criteria 📋

the IESG SHALL determine whether a spec meets the applicable criteria for the recommended action (see Sections 3.2 and 3.3 of this document) and SHALL share its findings with the IETF so the general Internet community can do a final review 📣 this IETF notification SHALL go out by electronic mail to the IETF mailing list 📬 there will often also be a presentation or statement from the appropriate Working Group or Area Director at an IETF plenary meeting 🎤 any significant issues that didn't get resolved during development MAY be raised at this point for final resolution by the IESG ⭐

the IESG SHALL send the IAB its recommendation for action, with a citation to the most current version of the doc 🧾 the IETF SHALL be notified by email of any such recommendation 💌 if the IAB finds a significant problem, or needs clarification on a particular point, it SHALL sort it out with the Working Group and its chairperson and/or the doc author, with help and agreement from the IESG and the relevant IETF Area Director 🤝

after IAB approval and any necessary editorial work, the RFC Editor SHALL publish the spec as an RFC 🎉 the spec SHALL then be removed from the Internet Drafts directory 👋

2.7. Entering the Standards Track ✨

a spec that's potentially an Internet Standard MAY come from:

  • (a) an IAB-sponsored effort (typically an IETF Working Group),
  • (b) independent activity by individuals, or
  • (c) an external organization.

in cases (b) and (c), the work might be tightly integrated with an existing IETF Working Group, or it might be offered for standardization without any prior IETF involvement 🧚 most of the time, a spec from an effort outside of an IETF Working Group gets submitted to an appropriate Working Group for evaluation and refinement 🫶 and if necessary, an appropriate Working Group gets created 🌈

for externally developed specs that are well integrated with existing Working Group efforts, a Working Group is assumed to give adequate community review of the accuracy and applicability of the spec 💖 if a Working Group can't resolve all the technical and usage questions, additional independent review MAY be necessary 🕵️ that review MAY happen within a Working Group context, or through an ad hoc review committee set up just for that purpose 🎀 it's the job of the appropriate IETF Area Director to decide what review, if any, an external spec needs, and how it SHALL be conducted 👑

2.8. Advancing in the Standards Track ✨

a spec SHALL stay at the Proposed Standard level for at least 6 months, and at the Draft Standard level for at least 4 months ⏳

a spec MAY be (and is pretty likely to be) revised as it moves through the standards track 🦋 at each stage, the IESG SHALL decide the scope and significance of the revision and, if necessary and appropriate, change the recommended action 🔄 minor revisions are expected and won't stop advancement through the standards track 💅 a significant revision MAY require that the spec gather more experience at its current maturity level before it progresses 📈 and if the spec has changed super significantly, the IESG MAY decide to treat the revision as a brand-new doc and restart it at the beginning of the standards track 🔁

if a spec hasn't reached the Standard maturity level within twenty-four months of first becoming a Proposed Standard, the IESG SHALL review it for viability 🧐 the IESG SHALL then recommend either ending or continuing the development effort to the IAB, and that recommendation SHALL be shared with the IETF by electronic mail on the IETF mailing list so the Internet community can comment 📬 this isn't meant to threaten legit, active Working Group efforts 🫶 it's just an admin tool for wrapping up a moribund effort 🪦

2.9. Revising a Standard ✨

If a revision of an established Internet Standard is recommended, the IESG has to evaluate the operational impact of rolling out a new version while the old one is still in use 👀. If the IESG accepts the recommendation, the new version shall go through the full Internet standardization process just like a completely new specification 💅. No shortcuts, bestie.

Once the new version reaches Standard level, it may immediately replace the previous version ✨. Sometimes both versions can stay Internet Standards so an installed base isn't left behind 🫶. But the relationship between the previous and new versions must be explicitly stated in the text of the new version or in another appropriate document (e.g., an Applicability Statement; see Section 3.1.2) 📚.

3. NOMENCLATURE 🎀

3.1. Types of Specifications 🧩

The specifications subject to the Internet standardization process fall into two categories: Technical Specifications (TS) and Applicability Statements (AS) 💜.

3.1.1. Technical Specification (TS) 🛠️

A Technical Specification is any description of a protocol, service, procedure, convention, or format 📝. It may completely describe all of the relevant aspects of its subject, or it may leave one or more parameters or options unspecified. A TS may be completely self-contained, or it may incorporate material from other specifications by reference to other documents (which may or may not be Internet Standards) 🔗.

A TS shall include a statement of its scope and the general intent for its use (domain of applicability). So a TS that is inherently specific to a particular context shall contain a statement to that effect 🎯. However, a TS does not specify requirements for its use within the Internet. Those requirements depend on the particular context in which the TS is incorporated by different system configurations, and they are defined by an Applicability Statement 🧠.

3.1.2. Applicability Statement (AS) 📋

An Applicability Statement specifies how, and under what circumstances, one or more TSs are to be applied to support a particular Internet capability 🦋. An AS may specify uses for TSs that are not Internet Standards, as discussed in Section 4.

An AS identifies the relevant TSs and the specific way in which they are to be combined. It may also specify particular values or ranges of TS parameters or subfunctions of a TS protocol that must be implemented. An AS also specifies the circumstances in which the use of a particular TS is required, recommended, or elective 🍓.

An AS may describe particular methods of using a TS in a restricted "domain of applicability", such as Internet routers, terminal servers, Internet systems that interface to Ethernets, or datagram-based database servers 🌸.

The broadest type of AS is a comprehensive conformance specification, commonly called a "requirements document", for a particular class of Internet systems [3,4,5], such as Internet routers or Internet hosts 👑.

An AS may not have a higher maturity level in the standards track than any TS to which the AS applies. For example, a TS at Draft Standard level may be referenced by an AS at the Proposed Standard or Draft Standard level, but not an AS at the Standard level. Like a TS, an AS does not come into effect until it reaches Standard level 🙈.

Although TSs and ASs are conceptually separate, in practice an Internet Standard RFC may include elements of both an AS and one or more TSs in a single document. For example, Technical Specifications that are developed specifically and exclusively for some particular domain of applicability, e.g., for mail server hosts, often contain within a single specification all of the relevant AS and TS information. In such cases, no useful purpose would be served by deliberately distributing the information among several documents just to preserve the formal AS/TS distinction 💅. However, a TS that is likely to apply to more than one domain of applicability should be developed in a modular fashion, to facilitate its incorporation by multiple ASs 🧚.

3.2. Standards Track Maturity Levels 🪜

ASs and TSs go through stages of development, testing, and acceptance. Within the Internet standards process, these stages are formally labeled "maturity levels" 🌈.

This section describes the maturity levels and the expected characteristics of specifications at each level. The general procedures for developing a specification and processing it through the maturity levels along the standards track were discussed in Section 2 above 🔁.

3.2.1. Proposed Standard

The entry-level maturity for the standards track is "Proposed Standard". A Proposed Standard specification is generally stable, has resolved known design choices, is believed to be well-understood, has received significant community review, and appears to enjoy enough community interest to be considered valuable ⭐.

Usually, neither implementation nor operational experience is required for the designation of a specification as a Proposed Standard. However, such experience is highly desirable, and will usually represent a strong argument in favor of a Proposed Standard designation 🙌. Furthermore, the IAB may require implementation and/or operational experience prior to granting Proposed Standard status to a specification that materially affects the core Internet protocols or that specifies behavior that may have significant operational impact on the Internet. Typically, such a specification will be published initially in the Experimental state (see below), which is not part of the standards track, and moved to the standards track only after sufficient implementation or operational experience has been obtained 🧪.

A Proposed Standard should have no known technical omissions with respect to the requirements placed upon it. In some cases, the IESG may recommend that the requirements be explicitly reduced in order to allow a protocol to advance into the Proposed Standard state. This can happen if the specification is considered to be useful and necessary (and timely), even absent the missing features. For example, some protocols have been advanced by explicitly deciding to omit security features at the Proposed Standard level, since an overall security architecture was still under development 🔐.

3.2.2. Draft Standard

A specification from which at least two independent and interoperable implementations have been developed, and for which adequate operational experience has been obtained, may be elevated to the "Draft Standard" level. This is a major advance in status, indicating a strong belief that the specification is mature and will be useful 🔥.

A Draft Standard must be well-understood and known to be quite stable, both in its semantics and as a basis for developing an implementation. A Draft Standard may still require additional or more widespread field experience, since it is possible for implementations based on Draft Standard specifications to demonstrate unforeseen behavior when subjected to large-scale use in production environments 😭.

3.2.3. Standard

A specification for which significant implementation and operational experience has been obtained may be elevated to the Standard level. A Standard is characterized by a high degree of technical maturity and by a generally held belief that the specified protocol or service provides significant benefit to the Internet community 🏆.

3.3. Non-Standards Track Maturity Levels 🚧

Not every TS or AS is on the standards track. A TS may not be intended to be an Internet Standard, or it may be intended for eventual standardization but not yet ready to enter the standards track. A TS or AS may have been superseded by more recent Internet Standards, or have otherwise fallen into disuse or disfavor. Such specifications are labeled with one of three "non-standards track" maturity levels: "Historic", "Experimental", and "Informational" 🗂️.

3.3.1. Historic

A TS or AS that has been superseded by a more recent specification, or is for any other reason considered to be obsolete, is assigned to the "Historic" level 🕰️. (Purists have suggested that the word should be "Historical"; however, at this point the use of "Historic" is historical. 💀)

3.3.2. Experimental

The "Experimental" designation on a TS permits widespread dissemination (through publication according to the procedures defined by this document) with explicit caveats. It may specify behavior that has not been thoroughly analyzed or is poorly understood; it may be subject to considerable change; it may never be a candidate for the formal standards track; and it may be discarded in favor of some other proposal 🧫.

Any TS that is not an immediate candidate for Internet standardization is appropriate for publication as Experimental. Interested parties are thereby given the opportunity to gain experience with implementations and to report their findings to the community of interest, but the specification is explicitly not recommended for general production use 🙅‍♀️.

3.3.3. Informational

An "Informational" specification is published for the general information of the Internet community, and does not represent an Internet community consensus or recommendation 📰.

Specifications that have been prepared outside of the Internet community and are not incorporated into the Internet standards process by any of the provisions of Section 4 may be published as Informational RFCs, with the permission of the owner. Such a document is not an Internet Standard in any sense 🌷.

3.4. Requirement Levels 📏

An AS may apply one of the following "requirement levels" to each of the TSs to which it refers:

(a) Required: Implementation of the referenced TS, as specified by the AS, is required to achieve minimal conformance. For example, IP and ICMP must be implemented by all Internet systems using the TCP/IP Protocol Suite 🌐.

(b) Recommended: Implementation of the referenced TS is not required for minimal conformance, but experience and/or generally accepted technical wisdom suggest its desirability in the domain of applicability of the AS. Vendors are strongly encouraged to include the functions, features, and protocols of Recommended TSs in their products, and should omit them only if the omission is justified by some special circumstance 🫶.

(c) Elective: okay so this one is giving optional 💅 Implementing the referenced TS is optional inside the AS's domain of applicability, which means the AS creates no explicit necessity to apply the TS. ngl a vendor might still decide to implement it anyway, or a user might decide it's a total necessity in their specific environment 🫶

As noted in Section 2.5, some TSs aren't on the standards track or have been retired from it, so they're not required, recommended, or elective. 🥀 For those TSs, there are two extra "requirement level" designations:

(d) Limited Use: the TS is considered appropriate only in limited or unique circumstances 🔬 For example, a protocol with the "Experimental" designation should generally be limited to people actively involved with the experiment 🧪

(e) Not Recommended: a TS considered inappropriate for general use is labeled "Not Recommended" 🚫 This might be because of its limited functionality, specialized nature, or historic status 🕰️

The "IAB Official Protocol Standards" RFC gives every TS a general requirement level, using the nomenclature defined in this section ✨ In lots of cases, you'll find more detailed descriptions of the requirement levels for particular protocols and their individual features in the appropriate ASs 📚

4. EXTERNAL STANDARDS AND SPECIFICATIONS 🌈

Lots of de facto and de jure standards groups other than the IAB/IETF create and publish standards documents for network protocols and services 🌍 When these external specifications play an important role on the Internet, it's desirable to reach common agreements on how they're used. In other words, establish Internet Standards relating to these external specifications 🤝

There are two categories of external specifications:

  • (1) Open Standards: accredited national and international standards bodies, such as ANSI, ISO, IEEE, and CCITT, develop a variety of protocol and service specifications that are similar to Technical Specifications (see glossary in Appendix A) 📜 These specifications are generally de jure standards. Similarly, national and international groups publish "implementors' agreements" that are analogous to Applicability Statements, capturing a body of implementation-specific detail about the practical application of their standards 🛠️
  • (2) Vendor Specifications: a vendor-specific specification that has become widely used on the Internet may be treated by the Internet community as a de facto "standard" 🏷️ Such a specification is not generally developed in an open fashion, is typically proprietary, and is controlled by the vendor or vendors that produced it 🔒

To avoid conflict between competing versions of a specification, the Internet community will not standardize a TS or AS that is simply an "Internet version" of an existing external specification, unless an explicit cooperative arrangement to do so has been made 🙅‍♀️ There are, however, several ways an external specification that matters for the operation and/or evolution of the Internet can be adopted for Internet use:

  • (a) Incorporation of an Open Standard: an Internet Standard TS or AS may incorporate an open external standard by reference. The reference must be to a specific version of the external standard, e.g., by publication date or by edition number, according to the prevailing convention of the organization responsible for the specification 📌

For example, many Internet Standards incorporate by reference the ANSI standard character set "ASCII" [7] 🔤

  • (b) Incorporation of a Vendor Specification: vendor-proprietary specifications can also be incorporated, by reference to a specific version of the vendor standard. If the vendor-proprietary specification is not widely and readily available, the IAB may request that it be published as an Informational RFC 📄

For a vendor-proprietary specification to be incorporated within the Internet standards process, the proprietor must agree in writing to the IAB that "right to use" licenses will be available on a non-discriminatory basis and at a reasonable cost. See also Sections 5 and 6 ✍️

Also, the IAB/IETF will generally not favor one vendor's proprietary specification over the technically equivalent and competing specifications of other vendors by making it "required" or "recommended" ⚖️

  • (c) Assumption: an IETF Working Group may start with a vendor's (or other body's) voluntarily contributed specification, and independently evolve it into a TS or AS. Here "independently" means the IETF work is not constrained by conditions imposed by the owner of the original specification 🦋 However, the original owner's continued participation in the IETF work is likely to be valuable, and it is encouraged 🫶 The IAB must receive a formal delegation of responsibility from the original owner that gives the IAB/IETF responsibility for evolving the specification 📝

As provided by section 3.1.2, an AS that specifies how an external technical specification should be applied on the Internet, incorporating the external specification by reference, may become an Internet Standard 🎀

5. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS 💜

Before a specification is approved as a Proposed Standard, all interested parties are required to disclose to the IAB the existence of any intellectual property right claims known to them that might apply to any aspect of the Proposed Standard 🧾

This requirement refers specifically to disclosing the existence of a current or anticipated intellectual property right claim, not the details of the asserted right itself 🔍

6. PATENT POLICY 🧾

This section is tentative, subject to legal review.

There's no objection in principle to drafting an Internet Standard in terms that include an item or items subject to patent rights that may have been asserted in one or more countries, if it's considered that technical reasons justify this approach 💡 In such cases, the procedure described in this section shall be followed 📋

6.1 Statement from Patent Holder

Before the specification is approved as a Proposed Standard, the IAB shall receive from the known patent holders, in a form acceptable to and approved by the IAB, either (a) assurance in the form of a general disclaimer to the effect that the patent holder does not hold and does not anticipate holding any right that would be violated as a consequence of conformance to the standard, or (b) assurance that:

  • (1) a license will be made available without compensation to all applicants desiring to utilize the patented items for the purpose of implementing the standard, or
  • (2) a license will be made available to applicants under specified reasonable terms and conditions that are, to the satisfaction of the IAB, demonstrably free of any unfair discrimination.

The terms and conditions of any license falling under (1) or (2) shall be submitted to the IAB for review, together with a statement of the number of independent licenses, if any, that have accepted or indicated their acceptance of the terms and conditions of the license 🔎

In addition, the letter to the IAB must contain (c) assurance that the patent holder does have the right to grant the license, and (d) a notification of any other patent licenses that are required, or else the assurance that no other licenses are required 📬

6.2 Record of Statement

A record of the patent holder's statement (and a statement from the IAB of the basis for considering such terms and conditions to be free of any unfair discrimination) shall be placed and retained in the files of the IAB 🗂️

6.3 Notice

When the IAB receives from a patent holder the assurance set forth in section 5.1(1) or 5.1(2), the corresponding Internet Standard shall include a note as follows 🔔

"NOTE:  The user's attention is called to the possibility that
compliance with this standard may require the use of an invention
or work covered by patent claims.

"By publication of this standard, no position is taken with
respect to the validity of this claim or of any patent rights in
connection therewith.  The patent holder has, however, filed a
statement of willingness to grant a license under these rights, on
reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms and conditions, to
applicants desiring to obtain such a license.  Details may be
obtained from the IAB."

6.4 Identifying Patents

The IAB shall not be responsible for identifying all patents for which a license may be required by an Internet Standard, nor for conducting inquiries into the legal validity or scope of those patents that are brought to its attention 🕵️‍♀️

7. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND REFERENCES 🙌

This document is the combined output of the Internet Activities Board and the Internet Engineering Steering Group, the groups charged with managing the processes described in it 👑 Major contributions to the text were made by Bob Braden, Vint Cerf, Lyman Chapin, Dave Crocker, and Barry Leiner 💖 Helpful comments and suggestions came from a number of IETF members 🫶

The references, in order:

  • [1] Cerf, V., "The Internet Activities Board", RFC 1160, IAB, May 1990.
  • [2] Postel, J., "IAB Official Protocol Standards", RFC 1280, IAB, March 1992.
  • [3] Braden, R., Editor, "Requirements for Internet Hosts -- Communication Layers", RFC 1122, IETF, October 1989.
  • [4] Braden, R., Editor, "Requirements for Internet Hosts -- Application and Support", RFC 1123, IETF, October 1989.
  • [5] Almquist, P., Editor, "Requirements for IP Routers", in preparation.
  • [6] Hinden, R., "Internet Engineering Task Force Internet Routing Protocol Standardization Criteria", RFC 1264, BBN, October 1991.
  • [7] ANSI, Coded Character Set -- 7-Bit American Standard Code for Information Interchange, ANSI X3.4-1986.
  • [8] Reynolds, J., and J. Postel, "Assigned Numbers", RFC 1060, ISI, March 1990.
  • [9] Postel, J., "Introduction to the STD Notes", RFC 1311, ISI, March 1992.

APPENDIX A: GLOSSARY 📖✨

ANSI:  American National Standards Institute

CCITT: Consultative Committee for International Telephone and
          Telegraphy.

          A part of the UN Treaty Organization: the International
          Telecommunications Union (ITU).

DARPA: (U.S.) Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

ISO:   International Organization for Standardization

APPENDIX B: FUTURE ISSUES 🔮

okay bestie, this is the "to be continued" page 🧚 This memo came out of an effort to write down how the Internet community currently does standards stuff, and ngl that's already iconic. But at publication time, Sections 5 and 6 were still going through legal review 💀. There are also big open questions about how to handle copyrights and other intellectual property issues. So it got published with these matters unresolved, because it's important enough to not wait 🫶

Pre-publication review gave a bunch of useful suggestions from the Internet community and also opened up several new issues 👀. The IAB and IESG are going to keep thinking about these questions and try to resolve them, and the results will be be incorporated in future versions of this memo.

For future reference, this appendix keeps track of the outstanding suggestions and issues 📝

It has been suggested that additional procedures in the following areas should be considered:

  • Appeals Procedure
    • Should there be some formal appeals procedure for correcting abuses or procedural failures, at each decision point in the process?
  • Tracking Procedure
    • Should there be a formal procedure for tracking problems and change requests, as a specification moves through the standards track? Such a procedure might include written responses, which were cataloged and disseminated, or simply a database that listed changes between versions.
  • Rationale Documentation
    • Should the procedures require written documentation of the rationale for the design decisions behind each specification at the Draft Standard and Standard levels?
  • Application-Layer Standards
    • Should there be some way to "standardize" application-layer protocols that are not going to become Internet Standards?

There were suggestions for fine-tuning the existing procedures too 🎀

  • Increase minimum time in Internet Draft directory from 2 weeks to 1 month.
  • Place explicit time limit, on IESG and IAB action on suggested standards changes. Limits suggested: three months.
    • If it were necessary to extend the time for some reason, the IETF would have to be explicitly notified.
  • Change minimum time at Draft Standard from 4 to 5 months, to ensure that an IETF meeting will intervene.
  • There were differing suggestions on how to balance between early implementation of specifications available only as Internet Drafts, and ensuring that everyone is clear that such an Internet Draft has no official status and is subject to change at any time. One suggestion was that vendors should not claim compliance with an Internet Draft.

Finally, there were suggestions for improvements in the documentation of the standards procedures 🌸

  • Discuss the impact, if any, of export control laws on the Internet standardization process.
    • It was observed that the Requirements RFCs contain "negative" requirement levels: MUST NOT and SHOULD NOT. Such levels are not recognized in this Procedures document.
  • Document needs to more clearly explain the criteria for choosing the Experimental vs. Informational category for an off-track specification. Ref. sections 3.3.2, 3.3.4.
  • Develop recommended wording for citations to Internet Drafts, which makes clear the provisional, unofficial nature of that document.
  • Consider changing the name attached to a fully-adopted standard from "Standard" to some qualified term like "Full Standard".
  • It has been suggested that the document should more strongly encourage the use of specifications from other standards bodies, with Internet-specific changes to be made only for compelling reasons. Further, the justification of the compelling requirement would be subject to special review.

Security Considerations 🔐

Real talk, this part is serious 😭 Security issues are not substantially discussed in this memo.

Author's Address 💌

A. Lyman Chapin
BBN Communications Corporation
150 Cambridge Park Drive
Cambridge, MA  02140

Phone: 617-873-3133
Fax:   617-873-4086

Email: Lyman@BBN.COM

the end, slay 🌈✨💅

📦 where this page comes from