RFC 2026
The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 3
RFC 2026: The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 3 💅🎀
Okay bestie, the header first 🫶 This one is by S. Bradner at Harvard University, dated October 1996. It's a Best Current Practice (BCP 9) from the Network Working Group, and it obsoletes RFC 1602, so that one is retired now. The header doesn't list any updates. 🌸
Status of This Memo ✨
This document is a Best Current Practice for the Internet Community, and it's asking everyone for discussion and suggestions for improvements 💜 You're allowed to distribute it as much as you want, since distribution is unlimited 🦋
Abstract 🌈
This memo writes down how the Internet community standardizes protocols and procedures 📝 It lays out the stages of standardization, what a document needs to do to move from one stage to the next, and the kinds of documents that show up along the way. It also covers the intellectual property rights and copyright stuff that comes with the whole standards process 🫠
Table of Contents 📚
1. INTRODUCTION....................................................2
1.1 Internet Standards...........................................3
1.2 The Internet Standards Process...............................3
1.3 Organization of This Document................................5
2. INTERNET STANDARDS-RELATED PUBLICATIONS.........................5
2.1 Requests for Comments (RFCs).................................5
2.2 Internet-Drafts..............................................7
3. INTERNET STANDARD SPECIFICATIONS................................8
3.1 Technical Specification (TS).................................8
3.2 Applicability Statement (AS).................................8
3.3 Requirement Levels...........................................9
4. THE INTERNET STANDARDS TRACK...................................10
4.1 Standards Track Maturity Levels.............................11
4.1.1 Proposed Standard.......................................11
4.1.2 Draft Standard..........................................12
4.1.3 Internet Standard.......................................13
4.2 Non-Standards Track Maturity Levels.........................13
4.2.1 Experimental............................................13
4.2.2 Informational...........................................14
4.2.3 Procedures for Experimental and Informational RFCs......14
4.2.4 Historic................................................15
5. Best Current Practice (BCP) RFCs...............................15
5.1 BCP Review Process..........................................16
6. THE INTERNET STANDARDS PROCESS.................................17
6.1 Standards Actions...........................................17
6.1.1 Initiation of Action....................................17
6.1.2 IESG Review and Approval................................17
6.1.3 Publication.............................................18
6.2 Advancing in the Standards Track............................19
6.3 Revising a Standard.........................................20
6.4 Retiring a Standard.........................................20
6.5 Conflict Resolution and Appeals.............................21
6.5.1 Working Group Disputes...................................21
6.5.2 Process Failures.........................................22
6.5.3 Questions of Applicable Procedure........................22
6.5.4 Appeals Procedure........................................23
7. EXTERNAL STANDARDS AND SPECIFICATIONS..........................23
7.1 Use of External Specifications..............................24
7.1.1 Incorporation of an Open Standard.......................24
7.1.2 Incorporation of a Other Specifications.................24
7.1.3 Assumption..............................................25
8. NOTICES AND RECORD KEEPING......................................25
9. VARYING THE PROCESS.............................................26
9.1 The Variance Procedure.......................................26
9.2 Exclusions...................................................27
10. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS..................................27
10.1. General Policy............................................27
10.2 Confidentiality Obligations...............................28
10.3. Rights and Permissions....................................28
10.3.1. All Contributions......................................28
10.3.2. Standards Track Documents..............................29
10.3.3 Determination of Reasonable and
Non-discriminatory Terms................................30
10.4. Notices...................................................30
11. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS................................................32
12. SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS........................................32
13. REFERENCES.....................................................33
14. DEFINITIONS OF TERMS...........................................33
15. AUTHOR'S ADDRESS...............................................34
APPENDIX A: GLOSSARY OF ACRONYMS...................................351. INTRODUCTION 🦋
Okay so this memo is all about how the Internet community standardizes protocols and procedures, aka the way they make the rules official 💅 The Internet Standards process is an activity of the Internet Society. It's organized and run for the Internet community by the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) and the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG) 👑
1.1. Internet Standards 🌐
The Internet is a loosely organized international collab of autonomous, interconnected networks, and it lets hosts talk to each other just because everyone voluntarily sticks to open protocols and procedures defined by Internet Standards 🫶 There are also a bunch of isolated interconnected networks that aren't hooked up to the global Internet but still use Internet Standards, which is iconic ✨
The Internet Standards Process in this document cares about every protocol, procedure, and convention used in or by the Internet, whether or not it's part of the TCP/IP protocol suite 💜 Now, if a non-Internet organization developed or standardized the protocol, the process usually applies to how that protocol gets used in the Internet context, not to the specification of the protocol itself 🙈
In general, an Internet Standard is a specification that is stable and well-understood, is technically competent, has multiple, independent, and interoperable implementations with substantial operational experience, enjoys significant public support, and is recognizably useful in some or all parts of the Internet. Main character energy, fr fr 👑
1.2. The Internet Standards Process 🌸
In outline, making an Internet Standard is pretty straightforward 💖 A specification goes through a period of development and several rounds of review by the Internet community, gets revised based on experience, gets adopted as a Standard by the right body (more on that below), and then gets published. In practice it's messier, because of (1) how hard it is to write specifications of high technical quality; (2) the need to consider the interests of all the affected parties; (3) the importance of building widespread community consensus; and (4) how hard it is to figure out how useful a specific specification is to the Internet community 😭
The goals of the Internet Standards Process are:
- technical excellence;
- prior implementation and testing;
- clear, concise, and easily understood documentation;
- openness and fairness; and
- timeliness.
The procedures in this document are meant to be fair, open, and objective, to reflect existing (proven) practice, and to be flexible 🎀
- These procedures are meant to give a fair, open, and objective basis for developing, evaluating, and adopting Internet Standards. They give everyone plenty of room to participate and comment. At each stage, a specification is repeatedly discussed and its merits debated in open meetings and/or public electronic mailing lists, and it's made available for review through world-wide on-line directories 📬
- These procedures are explicitly aimed at recognizing and adopting generally-accepted practices. So a candidate specification must be implemented and tested for correct operation and interoperability by multiple independent parties, and used in increasingly demanding environments, before it can be adopted as an Internet Standard 🔥
- These procedures give a lot of flexibility to adapt to all the different situations that come up in standardization. Experience has shown that this flexibility is vital for hitting the goals listed above 💅
Here's the tea: technical competence, required prior implementation and testing, and letting every interested party comment all take serious time and effort 😩 But today's fast-moving networking tech needs standards to show up on time, so the Internet Standards Process is trying to balance those opposing goals. The process is believed to be as short and simple as possible without sacrificing technical excellence, thorough testing before a standard is adopted, or openness and fairness ✨
Since the very beginning, the Internet has been, and is expected to stay, an evolving system where participants keep working new requirements and technology into its design and implementation 🌈 Users of the Internet and the providers of the equipment, software, and services that support it should expect this evolution and embrace it as a major tenet of Internet philosophy. Iykyk 🫶
The procedures in this document are the result of several years of evolution, shaped by the needs of the growing and increasingly diverse Internet community, and by experience 🦋
1.3. Organization of This Document 📚
Okay bestie, here's the map 🗺️ Section 2 covers the publications and archives of the Internet Standards Process. Section 3 covers the types of Internet standard specifications. Section 4 covers the Internet standards specifications track. Section 5 covers Best Current Practice RFCs. Section 6 covers the process and rules for Internet standardization. Section 7 specifies how externally-sponsored specifications and practices, which are developed and controlled by other standards bodies or by others, get handled within the Internet Standards Process 🧚 Section 8 covers the requirements for notices and record keeping. Section 9 defines a variance process that allows one-time exceptions to some of the requirements in this document. Section 10 presents the rules that are required to protect intellectual property rights in the context of developing and using Internet Standards 💜 Section 11 includes acknowledgments of some of the people who helped create this document. Section 12 notes that security issues are not dealt with by this document. Yes, you read that right 💀 Section 13 contains a list of numbered references. Section 14 contains definitions of some of the terms used in this document. Section 15 lists the author's email and postal addresses. And Appendix A contains a list of frequently-used acronyms 🍓
2. INTERNET STANDARDS-RELATED PUBLICATIONS 🎀
2.1. Requests for Comments (RFCs) 📜
okay so every single version of an Internet standards-related spec gets published as part of the "Request for Comments" (RFC) series 💖 This archival series is the official publishing channel for Internet standards docs and other publications from the IESG, IAB, and the wider Internet community. You can grab RFCs from a bunch of Internet hosts using anonymous FTP, gopher, the World Wide Web, and other Internet document-retrieval systems 🌐
The RFC series for networking started in 1969 as part of the original ARPA wide-area networking (ARPANET) project (see Appendix A for glossary of acronyms) 🦋 RFCs cover way more than Internet Standards, from early discussion of new research concepts to status memos about the Internet. Publishing RFCs is the direct responsibility of the RFC Editor, under the general direction of the IAB 👑
The rules for formatting and submitting an RFC are defined in [5]. Every RFC is available in ASCII text. Some RFCs are also available in other formats. Those other versions may contain material (like diagrams and figures) that isn't in the ASCII version, and they may be formatted differently 🎀
Now the important bit, bestie, so pay attention 👀
*********************************************************
* *
* A stricter requirement applies to standards-track *
* specifications: the ASCII text version is the *
* definitive reference, and therefore it must be a *
* complete and accurate specification of the standard, *
* including all necessary diagrams and illustrations. *
* *
*********************************************************Standards-track specs get the strictest treatment 🚨 The ASCII text version is the definitive reference, so it must be a complete and accurate spec of the standard, including all the necessary diagrams and illustrations. No cap, that's the whole point of that box 💅
The status of Internet protocol and service specs is summarized periodically in an RFC called "Internet Official Protocol Standards" [1] ✨ That RFC shows the level of maturity and other helpful info for each Internet protocol or service spec (see section 3) 📊
Some RFCs document Internet Standards 💜 These form the 'STD' subseries of the RFC series [4]. When a spec has been adopted as an Internet Standard, it gets the extra label "STDxxx", but it keeps its RFC number and its place in the RFC series. (see section 4.1.3) 🌸
Some RFCs standardize the results of community deliberations about statements of principle, or conclusions about the best way to perform some operations or IETF process functions 🧠 These RFCs form the specification has been adopted as a BCP, it is given the additional label "BCPxxx", but it keeps its RFC number and its place in the RFC series. (see section 5) 🍓
Heads up, this sentence is a little tangled in the original. It trails off after "These RFCs form", so I've kept the wording as written rather than guessing what it was supposed to say 🙈
Not all specs of protocols or services for the Internet should or will become Internet Standards or BCPs 🧚 Non-standards track specs aren't subject to the rules for Internet standardization. They may be published directly as "Experimental" or "Informational" RFCs, at the discretion of the RFC Editor in consultation with the IESG (see section 4.2) 🦄
********************************************************
* *
* It is important to remember that not all RFCs *
* are standards track documents, and that not all *
* standards track documents reach the level of *
* Internet Standard. In the same way, not all RFCs *
* which describe current practices have been given *
* the review and approval to become BCPs. See *
* RFC-1796 [6] for further information. *
* *
********************************************************Bestie, not every RFC is standards track, and not every standards track doc becomes an Internet Standard. Same deal with current-practice RFCs: they haven't all gotten the review and approval to become BCPs. See RFC-1796 [6] for more 📚
2.2. Internet-Drafts ✍️
During development, draft versions of a spec are made available for informal review and comment by putting them in the IETF's "Internet-Drafts" directory, which is copied across a bunch of Internet hosts 🌷 This makes an evolving working doc easy for a wide audience to find, which helps with review and revision. It's giving collaboration 🫶
An Internet-Draft that gets published as an RFC, or that has sat unchanged in the Internet-Drafts directory for more than six months without the IESG recommending it for publication as an RFC, is simply removed from the directory 🗑️ At any time, an Internet-Draft can be replaced by a newer version of the same spec, which restarts the six-month timeout period ⏳
An Internet-Draft is NOT a means of "publishing" a spec. Specs get published through the RFC mechanism from the previous section. Internet-Drafts have no formal status and can be changed or removed at any time 🙅♀️
********************************************************
* *
* Under no circumstances should an Internet-Draft *
* be referenced by any paper, report, or Request- *
* for-Proposal, nor should a vendor claim compliance *
* with an Internet-Draft. *
* *
********************************************************This one is SERIOUS 😭 Under no circumstances should an Internet-Draft be referenced by a paper, report, or Request-for-Proposal, and a vendor should never claim compliance with one 🚫
Note: It is acceptable to reference a standards-track spec that may reasonably be expected to be published as an RFC using the phrase "Work in Progress", without referencing an Internet-Draft. This may also be done in a standards track doc itself, as long as the spec where the reference is made would stand as a complete and understandable document with or without the reference to the "Work in Progress" 🔖
3. INTERNET STANDARD SPECIFICATIONS 🏆
Specs subject to the Internet Standards Process fall into one of two categories: Technical Specification (TS) and Applicability Statement (AS) 💎
3.1. Technical Specification (TS) 🛠️
A Technical Specification is any description of a protocol, service, procedure, convention, or format ✨ It may completely describe all 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 pull in material from other specs by reference to other documents (which might or might 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's 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 where the TS gets incorporated by different system configurations, and they're defined by an Applicability Statement 💅
3.2. Applicability Statement (AS) 🎀
An Applicability Statement specifies how, and under what circumstances, one or more TSs may be applied to support a particular Internet capability. An AS may specify uses for TSs that are not Internet Standards, as discussed in Section 7 🌈
An AS identifies the relevant TSs and the specific way they're 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 (see section 3.3) 🧩
An AS may describe particular methods of using a TS in a restricted "domain of applicability", like 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, like Internet routers or Internet hosts 👑
An AS may not have a higher maturity level in the standards track than any standards-track TS it relies on (see section 4.1). For example, a TS at Draft Standard level may be referenced by an AS at the Proposed Standard or Draft Standard level, but not by an AS at the Standard level 📶
3.3. Requirement Levels 🚦
An AS shall apply one of the following "requirement levels" to each of the TSs it refers to:
- (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. For example, the TELNET protocol should be implemented by all systems that would benefit from remote access. 💫
- (c) Elective: Implementation of the referenced TS is optional within the domain of applicability of the AS; that is, the AS creates no explicit necessity to apply the TS. However, a particular vendor may decide to implement it, or a particular user may decide that it is a necessity in a specific environment. For example, the DECNET MIB could be seen as valuable in an environment where the DECNET protocol is used. 🍭
As noted in section 4.1, there are TSs that are not in the standards track or that have been retired from the standards track, and are therefore not required, recommended, or elective. Two additional "requirement level" designations are available for these TSs:
- (d) Limited Use: The TS is considered to be appropriate for use only in limited or unique circumstances. For example, the usage of a protocol with the "Experimental" designation should generally be limited to those actively involved with the experiment. 🧪
- (e) Not Recommended: A TS that is considered to be inappropriate for general use is labeled "Not Recommended". This may be because of its limited functionality, specialized nature, or historic status. 🙃
Although TSs and ASs are conceptually separate, in practice a standards-track doc may combine an AS and one or more related TSs. For example, Technical Specifications developed specifically and exclusively for some particular domain of applicability, e.g., for mail server hosts, often contain all of the relevant AS and TS info within a single spec. In those cases, there's no useful purpose in deliberately spreading the info across several docs just to preserve the formal AS/TS distinction 📬 However, a TS that's likely to apply to more than one domain of applicability should be developed in a modular fashion, so it's easy for multiple ASs to incorporate it 🧱
The "Official Protocol Standards" RFC (STD1) lists a general requirement level for each TS, using the nomenclature defined in this section. This RFC is updated periodically. In many cases, more detailed descriptions of the requirement levels of particular protocols and of individual features of those protocols will be found in appropriate ASs 🥰
4. THE INTERNET STANDARDS TRACK ✨
Okay bestie, so specs that are meant to become Internet Standards don't just show up finished. They glow up through a bunch of maturity levels called the "standards track" 🛤️. Those levels, "Proposed Standard", "Draft Standard", and "Standard", get explained in section 4.1, and the way a spec actually moves along the track is in section 6 💅.
Even after something becomes an Internet Standard, it keeps evolving 🌱 because we learn stuff from using it and new requirements show up. The process lets old Internet Standards get replaced by new ones, and lets retired ones get labels saying their status is "retired" 🪦. There's also a set of maturity levels in section 4.2 for specs that aren't on the standards track at all 🫶.
4.1. Standards Track Maturity Levels
Specs go through stages of development, testing, and acceptance 🧪. Inside the Internet Standards Process, those stages get official names called "maturity levels" 🎀.
This section walks through each maturity level and what a spec at that level is expected to look like ✨.
4.1.1. Proposed Standard
"Proposed Standard" is the entry-level maturity for the standards track 🚪. To get a spec onto the standards track at this level, a specific action by the IESG is required 📋.
A Proposed Standard is generally stable, has settled its known design choices, is believed to be well-understood, has gotten significant community review, and seems to have enough community interest to be valuable 💜. Still, more experience might change it or even pull it back before it moves up 🙈.
Usually, implementation and operational experience aren't needed to get the Proposed Standard label 🤷♀️. However, that experience is highly desirable, and it'll usually be a strong argument in favor of the designation 🔥.
The IESG may require implementation and/or operational experience before granting Proposed Standard status to a spec that materially affects the core Internet protocols, or that specifies behavior that may have significant operational impact on the Internet 🌐.
A Proposed Standard should have no known technical omissions with respect to the requirements placed upon it. However, the IESG may waive this if the spec is considered useful and necessary (and timely) even with known technical omissions 🙏.
Implementors should treat Proposed Standards as immature specs 🐣. It's desirable to implement them to gain experience and to validate, test, and clarify the spec. However, since the content may change if problems are found or better solutions are identified, deploying implementations into a disruption-sensitive environment is not recommended 🚫.
4.1.2. Draft Standard
A spec from which at least two independent and interoperable implementations from different code bases have been developed, and for which sufficient successful operational experience has been obtained, may be elevated to the "Draft Standard" level 🆙. For this section, "interoperable" means functionally equivalent or interchangeable components of the system or process they're used in 🧩. If patented or otherwise controlled technology is required for implementation, the separate implementations must also have resulted from separate exercise of the licensing process 📜. Elevation to Draft Standard is a major glow-up, signaling a strong belief that the spec is mature and useful 👑.
The requirement for at least two independent and interoperable implementations applies to all of the options and features of the spec. If one or more options or features haven't been demonstrated in at least two interoperable implementations, the spec may advance to Draft Standard only if those options or features are removed ✂️.
The Working Group chair is responsible for documenting the specific implementations that qualify the spec for Draft or Internet Standard status, along with documentation about testing their interoperation 📝. That documentation must include information about the support of each of the individual options and features. It should be submitted to the Area Director with the protocol action request. (see Section 6)
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 🧱. It may still require additional or more widespread field experience, since implementations can show unforeseen behavior when used at large scale in production environments 🌋.
A Draft Standard is normally considered a final spec, and changes are likely to be made only to solve specific problems encountered 🔒. In most circumstances, it's reasonable for vendors to deploy Draft Standard implementations into a disruption-sensitive environment 💖.
4.1.3. Internet Standard
A spec for which significant implementation and successful operational experience has been obtained may be elevated to the Internet Standard level 🏆. An Internet Standard (which may simply be called 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 🌈.
A spec that reaches Standard status is assigned a number in the STD series while keeping its RFC number 🔢.
4.2. Non-Standards Track Maturity Levels
Not every spec is on the standards track 🙅. A spec 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 spec may have been superseded by a more recent Internet Standard, or otherwise fallen into disuse or disfavor 🥀.
Specs that aren't on the standards track get labeled with one of three "off-track" maturity levels: "Experimental", "Informational", or "Historic". Documents bearing these labels are not Internet Standards in any sense 🚫.
4.2.1. Experimental
The "Experimental" designation typically means a spec that's part of some research or development effort 🔬. Such a spec is published for the general information of the Internet technical community and as an archival record of the work, subject only to editorial considerations and to verification that there has been adequate coordination with the standards process (see below) 📚. An Experimental spec may be the output of an organized Internet research effort (e.g., a Research Group of the IRTF), an IETF Working Group, or it may be an individual contribution 🧑🔬.
4.2.2. Informational
An "Informational" spec is published for the general information of the Internet community, and doesn't represent an Internet community consensus or recommendation 💁. The Informational designation exists to provide timely publication of a very broad range of responsible informational documents from many sources, subject only to editorial considerations and to verification that there has been adequate coordination with the standards process (see section 4.2.3) ✨.
Specs prepared outside of the Internet community, and not incorporated into the Internet Standards Process by any of the provisions of section 10, may be published as Informational RFCs, with the permission of the owner and the concurrence of the RFC Editor 🤝.
4.2.3. Procedures for Experimental and Informational RFCs
Unless they're the result of IETF Working Group action, documents intended to be published with Experimental or Informational status should be submitted directly to the RFC Editor 📮. The RFC Editor will publish any such documents as Internet-Drafts which haven't already been published that way. To tell these Internet-Drafts apart, they'll be labeled or grouped in the I-D directory so they're easily recognizable 👀. The RFC Editor waits two weeks after this publication for comments before proceeding further ⏳. The RFC Editor is expected to exercise his or her judgment concerning the editorial suitability of a document for publication with Experimental or Informational status, and may refuse to publish a document that, in the expert opinion of the RFC Editor, is unrelated to Internet activity or falls below the technical and/or editorial standard for RFCs 🙅♀️.
To make sure the non-standards track Experimental and Informational designations aren't misused to get around the Internet Standards Process 🕵️, the IESG and the RFC Editor have agreed that the RFC Editor will refer to the IESG any document submitted for Experimental or Informational publication that, in the opinion of the RFC Editor, may be related to work being done, or expected to be done, within the IETF community 🫣. The IESG shall review such a referred document within a reasonable period of time, and recommend either that it be published as originally submitted, or referred to the IETF as a contribution to the Internet Standards Process 📬.
If (a) the IESG recommends that the document be brought within the IETF and progressed within the IETF context, but the author declines to do so, or (b) the IESG considers that the document proposes something that conflicts with, or is actually inimical to, an established IETF effort, the document may still be published as an Experimental or Informational RFC 😬. In these cases, however, the IESG may insert appropriate "disclaimer" text into the RFC either in or immediately following the "Status of this Memo" section, so readers can tell what's going on 📢.
Documents proposed for Experimental and Informational RFCs by IETF Working Groups go through IESG review. That review is initiated using the process described in section 6.1.1 🎬.
4.2.4. Historic
A spec that has been superseded by a more recent spec, or is for any other reason considered 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. 🙃)
Note: Standards track specifications normally must not depend on other standards track specifications which are at a lower maturity level, or on non standards track specifications other than referenced specifications from other standards bodies. (See Section 7.) 💜
5. BEST CURRENT PRACTICE (BCP) RFCs ✨
okay so the BCP subseries is where we lock in practices and the stuff the community has actually talked through 🫶 it's built to standardize that. a BCP goes through the same basic set of procedures as standards track docs, so it's literally how the IETF community can define and ratify its best current thinking on a statement of principle, or on what's believed to be the best way to perform some operations or IETF process function 💅
historically, Internet standards were mostly about the technical specs for the hardware and software needed for computer communication across interconnected networks 🖥️ but the Internet is made of networks run by a bunch of different orgs with different goals and rules, so good user service needs the operators and admins to follow some common guidelines for policies and operations 🌸 those guidelines are usually different in scope and style from protocol standards, but making them still needs a similar consensus-building process 🤝
quick sidenote: the IAB and IESG are made of individuals who can take part in IETF technical work as individuals ✨ but the entities themselves are also leaders in the community 👑 as leaders, they should have an outlet to propose ideas to stir up work in an area, raise the community's sensitivity to an issue, make a statement of architectural principle, or share their thoughts on other matters. the BCP subseries gives those management entities a neat, structured way to put proposals into the IETF's consensus machinery while gauging how the community feels 🦋
last one: the BCP series can also document the operation of the IETF itself 💖 for example, this document defines the IETF Standards Process and is published as a BCP.
5.1 BCP Review Process
unlike standards-track docs, BCP mechanisms aren't well suited to the phased roll-in nature of the three stage standards track 🙈 they generally only make sense for full and immediate instantiation.
the BCP process is similar to the one for proposed standards 🎀 the BCP is submitted to the IESG for review (see section 6.1.1), and the existing review process applies, including a Last-Call on the IETF Announce mailing list. however, once the IESG has approved the document, the process ends and the document is published. the resulting doc is viewed as having the technical approval of the IETF 🏆
specifically, a document to be considered for the status of BCP must undergo the procedures outlined in sections 6.1, and 6.4 of this document. the BCP process may be appealed according to the procedures in section 6.5.
because BCPs are meant to express community consensus but are arrived at more quickly than standards, BCPs require particular care 🧐 specifically, BCPs should not be viewed simply as stronger Informational RFCs, but rather should be viewed as documents suitable for a content different from Informational RFCs. not the same vibe, bestie 💅
a specification, or group of specifications, that has, or have been approved as a BCP is assigned a number in the BCP series while retaining its RFC number(s) 🦋
6. THE INTERNET STANDARDS PROCESS 👑
the mechanics of the Internet Standards Process involve decisions by the IESG about elevating a specification onto the standards track, or moving a standards-track specification from one maturity level to another 🧚 although a number of reasonably objective criteria (described below and in section 4) are available to guide the IESG in deciding to move a specification onto, along, or off the standards track, there is no algorithmic guarantee of elevation to or progression along the standards track for any specification 🙃 the experienced collective judgment of the IESG about the technical quality of a specification proposed for elevation or advancement is an essential component of the decision-making process ⭐
6.1 Standards Actions
a "standards action" -- entering a particular specification into, advancing it within, or removing it from, the standards track -- must be approved by the IESG 🔥
6.1.1 Initiation of Action
a specification that is intended to enter or advance in the Internet standards track shall first be posted as an Internet-Draft (see section 2.2) unless it has not changed since publication as an RFC 📝 it shall remain as an Internet-Draft for a period of time, not less than two weeks, that permits useful community review, after which a recommendation for action may be initiated 🌈
a standards action is initiated by a recommendation from the IETF Working group responsible for a specification to its Area Director, copied to the IETF Secretariat or, in the case of a specification not associated with a Working Group, a recommendation by an individual to the IESG 💌
6.1.2 IESG Review and Approval
the IESG shall determine whether or not a specification submitted to it according to section 6.1.1 satisfies the applicable criteria for the recommended action (see sections 4.1 and 4.2), and shall in addition determine whether or not the technical quality and clarity of the specification is consistent with that expected for the maturity level to which the specification is recommended 🔍
in order to obtain all of the information necessary to make these determinations, particularly when the specification is considered by the IESG to be extremely important in terms of its potential impact on the Internet or on the suite of Internet protocols, the IESG may, at its discretion, commission an independent technical review of the specification 🧠
the IESG will send notice to the IETF of the pending IESG consideration of the document(s) to permit a final review by the general Internet community 📣 this "Last-Call" notification shall be sent via electronic mail to the IETF Announce mailing list. comments on a Last-Call shall be accepted from anyone, and should be sent as directed in the Last-Call announcement 💬
the Last-Call period shall be no shorter than two weeks, except in those cases where the proposed standards action was not initiated by an IETF Working Group, in which case the Last-Call period shall be no shorter than four weeks ⏳ if the IESG believes that community interest would be served by allowing more time for comment, it may decide on a longer Last-Call period or explicitly lengthen a current Last-Call period 🫧
the IESG is not bound by the action recommended when the specification was submitted 🤷♀️ for example, the IESG may decide to consider the specification for publication in a different category than the one requested. if the IESG determines this before the Last-Call is issued, then the Last-Call should reflect the IESG's view. the IESG could also decide to change the publication category based on the response to a Last-Call. if this decision would result in a specification being published at a "higher" level than the original Last-Call was for, a new Last-Call should be issued indicating the IESG recommendation 🪄 in addition, the IESG may decide to recommend the formation of a new Working Group in the case of significant controversy in response to a Last-Call for a specification not originating from an IETF Working Group 🧵
in a timely fashion after the expiration of the Last-Call period, the IESG shall make its final determination of whether or not to approve the standards action, and shall notify the IETF of its decision via electronic mail to the IETF Announce mailing list 🏁
6.1.3 Publication
if a standards action is approved, notification is sent to the RFC Editor and copied to the IETF, with instructions to publish the specification as an RFC 🎉 the specification shall at that point be removed from the Internet-Drafts directory 🗂️
an official summary of standards actions completed and pending shall appear in each issue of the Internet Society's newsletter. this shall constitute the "publication of record" for Internet standards actions 📰
the RFC Editor shall publish periodically an "Internet Official Protocol Standards" RFC [1], summarizing the status of all Internet protocol and service specifications 🌟
6.2. Advancing in the Standards Track 🦋
Okay so the whole 6.1 routine runs again for every single action that moves a spec up the standards track 🛤️ same steps, same vibes, periodt.
A specification SHALL remain at the Proposed Standard level for at least six (6) months ⏳
A specification SHALL remain at the Draft Standard level for at least four (4) months, or until at least one IETF meeting has occurred, whichever comes later 🎀
These minimum periods exist so the community gets enough time to review, without the process dragging on forever 💅 These intervals SHALL be measured from the date of publication of the corresponding RFC(s). If the action doesn't result in RFC publication, they're measured from the date of the announcement of the IESG approval of the action 📣
A specification may be (indeed, is likely to be) revised as it advances through the standards track 🌸 At each stage, the IESG SHALL determine the scope and significance of the revision to the specification, and, if necessary and appropriate, modify the recommended action. Minor revisions are expected, but a significant revision may require that the specification accumulate more experience at its current maturity level before progressing. And finally, if the specification has been changed very significantly, the IESG may recommend that the revision be treated as a new document, re-entering the standards track at the beginning 😭
Change of status SHALL result in republication of the specification as an RFC, except in the rare case that there have been no changes at all in the specification since the last publication 📚 Generally, desired changes get "batched" for incorporation at the next level in the standards track 🧺 However, deferring changes to the next standards action won't always be possible or desirable. For example, an important typographical error, or a technical error that doesn't change the overall function of the specification, may need to be corrected immediately 🙈 In those cases, the IESG or RFC Editor may be asked to republish the RFC (with a new number) with corrections, and this will not reset the minimum time-at-level clock ⏰
When a standards-track specification hasn't reached the Internet Standard level but has stayed at the same maturity level for twenty-four (24) months, and every twelve (12) months after that until the status changes, the IESG SHALL review the viability of the standardization effort behind that specification and the usefulness of the technology 🔍 After each review, the IESG SHALL approve termination or continuation of the development effort. At the same time, the IESG SHALL decide whether to keep the specification at the same maturity level or move it to Historic status. This decision SHALL be communicated to the IETF by electronic mail on the IETF Announce mailing list, so the Internet community gets a chance to comment 📬 This isn't meant to threaten a legitimate and active Working Group effort. It's just an administrative mechanism for wrapping up a moribund effort 🪦
6.3. Revising a Standard 🔄
A new version of an established Internet Standard MUST progress through the full Internet standardization process as if it were a completely new specification 👑 Once the new version reaches the Standard level, it will usually replace the previous version, which gets moved to Historic status. However, in some cases both versions may remain as Internet Standards to honor the requirements of an installed base 🫶 In that situation, the relationship between the previous and the 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 3.2) 📝
6.4. Retiring a Standard 🪦✨
As technology changes and matures, a new Standard specification can be so clearly superior technically that one or more existing standards track specifications for the same function SHOULD be retired 🚀 In this case, or when it's felt for some other reason that an existing standards track specification should be retired, the IESG SHALL approve a change of status of the old specification(s) to Historic. This recommendation SHALL be issued with the same Last-Call and notification procedures used for any other standards action 📣 A request to retire an existing standard can come from a Working Group, an Area Director, or some other interested party 🙋♀️
6.5. Conflict Resolution and Appeals ⚖️
Disputes can pop up at various stages of the IETF process 😤 The process is designed, as much as possible, so compromises can be made and genuine consensus reached. But sometimes even the most reasonable and knowledgeable people just can't agree 🥲 To keep things open and fair, such conflicts MUST be resolved through a process of open review and discussion 🕊️ This section lays out the procedures that SHALL be followed for Internet standards issues that can't be resolved through the normal way Working Groups and other Internet Standards Process participants reach consensus 💜
6.5.1. Working Group Disputes 🗣️
An individual (whether or not they're in the relevant Working Group) may disagree with a Working Group recommendation, because they believe either (a) their own views haven't been adequately considered by the Working Group, or (b) the Working Group has made an incorrect technical choice that puts the quality and/or integrity of the Working Group's product(s) in significant jeopardy 😬 The first one is a problem with Working Group process. The second one is a claim of technical error. These are super different, but both get handled by the same review process 🌈
A person who disagrees with a Working Group recommendation SHALL always first discuss the matter with the Working Group's chair(s), who may involve other members of the Working Group (or the whole Working Group) in the discussion 💬
If that doesn't resolve it, any of the parties involved may bring it to the attention of the Area Director(s) for the area where the Working Group is chartered. The Area Director(s) SHALL attempt to resolve the dispute 🧑💼
If the Area Director(s) can't resolve it, any of the parties involved may then appeal to the IESG as a whole. The IESG SHALL then review the situation and try to resolve it in whatever manner it chooses 🏛️
If the disagreement still isn't resolved to the parties' satisfaction at the IESG level, any of the parties involved may appeal the decision to the IAB. The IAB SHALL then review the situation and attempt to resolve it in a manner of its own choosing 🧠
The IAB decision is final on whether the Internet standards procedures were followed, and on all questions of technical merit 👑
6.5.2. Process Failures 🛠️
This document sets out procedures that are required to be followed, to ensure openness and fairness in the Internet Standards Process and the technical viability of the standards created 🔐 The IESG is the principal agent of the IETF for this purpose. It's the IESG that's in charge of making sure the required procedures were followed, and that any necessary prerequisites to a standards action have been met 💅
If an individual should disagree with an action taken by the IESG in this process, that person SHOULD first discuss the issue with the ISEG Chair 🙈 (The original text really says ISEG here, which is very clearly meant to be IESG.) If the IESG Chair can't satisfy the complainant, then the IESG as a whole SHOULD re-examine the action taken, along with input from the complainant, and determine whether any further action is needed. The IESG SHALL issue a report on its review of the complaint to the IETF 📣
Should the complainant not be satisfied with the outcome of the IESG review, an appeal may be lodged to the IAB. The IAB SHALL then review the situation, attempt to resolve it in a manner of its own choosing, and report to the IETF on the outcome of its review 🧾
If circumstances warrant, the IAB may direct that an IESG decision be annulled, and the situation SHALL then be as it was before the IESG decision was taken ⏪ The IAB may also recommend an action to the IESG, or make such other recommendations as it deems fit. The IAB MAY NOT, however, pre-empt the role of the IESG by issuing a decision that only the IESG is empowered to make 🚫
The IAB decision is final on whether or not the Internet standards procedures were followed ✅
6.5.3. Questions of Applicable Procedure 📜
Further recourse is only available in cases where the procedures themselves (i.e., the procedures described in this document) are claimed to be inadequate or insufficient to protect the rights of all parties in a fair and open Internet Standards Process 🫠 Claims on this basis may be made to the Internet Society Board of Trustees. The President of the Internet Society SHALL acknowledge such an appeal within two weeks, and SHALL, at the time of acknowledgment, advise the petitioner of the expected duration of the Trustees' review of the appeal ⏳ The Trustees SHALL review the situation in a manner of their own choosing and report to the IETF on the outcome of their review 🗳️
The Trustees' decision, once their review is complete, SHALL be final with respect to all aspects of the dispute 🏁
6.5.4. Appeals Procedure 📮
All appeals MUST include a detailed and specific description of the facts of the dispute 🔍
All appeals MUST be initiated within two months of the public knowledge of the action or decision being challenged ⏰
At all stages of the appeals process, the individuals or bodies responsible for making the decisions have the discretion to define the specific procedures they'll follow in making their decision 🧩
In all cases, a decision about the disposition of the dispute, and the communication of that decision to the parties involved, MUST be accomplished within a reasonable period of time 🕰️
[NOTE: These procedures intentionally and explicitly do not establish a fixed maximum time period that SHALL be considered "reasonable" in all cases. The Internet Standards Process places a premium on consensus and efforts to achieve it, and deliberately foregoes deterministically swift execution of procedures in favor of a latitude within which more genuine technical agreements may be reached.] 🌸✨
7. EXTERNAL STANDARDS AND SPECIFICATIONS ✨
Okay bestie, so loads of standards groups outside the IETF write up their own network protocol and service specs 📚. When one of those outside specs becomes a big deal on the Internet, it's really useful to agree on how it gets used, which means making Internet Standards about those external specs 🫶.
There are two categories of external specifications:
(1) Open Standards
Bodies like ANSI, ISO, IEEE, and ITU-T make all kinds of protocol and service specs that look a lot like the Technical Specifications we define here 🎀. National and international groups also publish "implementors' agreements", which are kind of like Applicability Statements, since they pile up all the implementation-specific detail needed to actually use the standards in the real world 🧚. The Internet Standards Process counts all of these as "open external standards" 💜.
(2) Other Specifications
Some proprietary specs have become so widely used on the Internet that the Internet community ends up treating them as if they were "standards" 👑. These are usually not developed in an open way. They're typically proprietary, and the vendor, vendors, or organization that made them keeps control over them 🙈.
7.1 Use of External Specifications
Here's the tea 🍓: to avoid a mess of competing versions, the Internet community will NOT standardize a spec that's just an "Internet version" of an existing external spec, unless there's an explicit cooperative arrangement to do exactly that 💅. That said, there are a few ways an external spec that matters for the Internet's operation and/or evolution can still get adopted for Internet use ✨.
7.1.1 Incorporation of an Open Standard
An Internet Standard TS or AS may pull in an open external standard by reference 🌸. For example, a ton of Internet Standards reference the ANSI standard character set "ASCII" [2] 🔥. Whenever possible, the referenced spec SHALL be available online 🫶.
7.1.2 Incorporation of Other Specifications
Other proprietary specs may be incorporated by reference to a version of the spec, as long as the proprietor meets the requirements of section 10 💖. If that proprietary spec isn't widely and readily available, the IESG may ask for it to be published as an Informational RFC 🦋.
The IESG SHOULD NOT favor one proprietary spec over technically equivalent and competing specification(s) by making any incorporated vendor spec "required" or "recommended" 🙅♀️. Not the vibe 😭.
7.1.3 Assumption
An IETF Working Group may start from an external spec and develop it into an Internet specification 🧚. This is acceptable if (1) the spec is provided to the Working Group in compliance with the requirements of section 10, and (2) change control has been conveyed to IETF by the original developer of the specification, for the specification or for specs derived from the original specification 💜.
8. NOTICES AND RECORD KEEPING ✨
Every organization involved in developing and approving Internet Standards SHALL publicly announce, and SHALL maintain a publicly accessible record of, every activity it engages in, to the extent that the activity represents the prosecution of any part of the Internet Standards Process 📢. For this section, those organizations include the IETF, the IESG, the IAB, all IETF Working Groups, and the Internet Society Board of Trustees 🌈.
For IETF and Working Group meetings, announcements SHALL be made by electronic mail to the IETF Announce mailing list, and SHALL be sent far enough ahead of time for all interested parties to participate effectively 💌. The announcement SHALL contain (or provide pointers to) all the info needed to support the participation of any interested individual 🎀. For a meeting, for example, the announcement SHALL include an agenda that spells out the standards-related issues that will be discussed 📋.
The formal record of an organization's standards-related activity SHALL include at least the following:
- the charter of the organization (or a defining document equivalent to a charter);
- complete and accurate minutes of meetings;
- the archives of Working Group electronic mail mailing lists; and
- all written contributions from participants that pertain to the organization's standards-related activity.
In practice, the IETF Secretariat keeps the formal record of all Internet Standards Process activities, and that's its responsibility 🗂️. The exception is that each IETF Working Group is expected to maintain its own email list archive, and MUST make a best effort to make sure all traffic is captured and included in the archives 🫶. Also, the Working Group chair is responsible for giving the IETF Secretariat complete and accurate minutes of all Working Group meetings 💅. Internet-Drafts that have been removed (for any reason) from the Internet-Drafts directories SHALL be archived by the IETF Secretariat, purely to preserve a historical record of Internet standards activity, so they can't be retrieved except in special circumstances 🥀.
9. VARYING THE PROCESS ✨
This document, which sets out the rules and procedures for making Internet Standards and related documents, is itself a product of the Internet Standards Process (as a BCP, as described in section 5) 🪞. It replaces a previous version, and in time it's likely to be replaced too 🦋.
When this document is published, it represents the community's view of the proper process and the requirements to be met, all so we can get the best possible Internet Standards and BCPs 💖. But it can't be assumed that this will always stay true 🙈. From time to time there may be a desire to update it by swapping in a new version. Updating this document uses the same open procedures as any other BCP 🌸.
Also, there may be situations where following the procedures leads to a deadlock about a specific specification, or situations where the procedures just don't give any guidance 😭. In those cases, it may be appropriate to invoke the variance procedure described below 🧚.
9.1 The Variance Procedure
Upon the recommendation of the responsible IETF Working Group (or, if no Working Group is constituted, upon the recommendation of an ad hoc committee), the IESG may put a particular specification into the standards track, or advance it within the standards track, even though some of the requirements of this document have not been or will not be met 👑. The IESG may approve such a variance, though, only if it first determines that the likely benefits to the Internet community are likely to outweigh any costs to the Internet community that come from not complying with the requirements in this document 🧐. When deciding, the IESG SHALL at least consider (a) the technical merit of the specification, (b) the possibility of achieving the goals of the Internet Standards Process without granting a variance, (c) alternatives to granting a variance, (d) the collateral and precedential effects of granting a variance, and (e) the IESG's ability to craft a variance that is as narrow as possible 🎯. When deciding whether to approve a variance, the IESG has discretion to limit the scope of the variance to particular parts of this document, and to impose any additional restrictions or limitations it thinks are appropriate to protect the interests of the Internet community 🛡️.
The proposed variance MUST detail the problem perceived, explain the precise provision of this document that's causing the need for a variance, and share the results of the IESG's considerations, including consideration of points (a) through (d) in the previous paragraph 📝. The proposed variance SHALL be issued as an Internet Draft 📄. The IESG SHALL then issue an extended Last-Call, of no less than 4 weeks, so the community can comment on the proposal 📣.
Within a timely fashion after the Last-Call period ends, the IESG SHALL make its final determination on whether or not to approve the proposed variance, and SHALL notify the IETF of its decision via electronic mail to the IETF Announce mailing list 📬. If the variance is approved, it SHALL be forwarded to the RFC Editor with a request that it be published as a BCP 🎉.
This variance procedure is for when a one-time waving of some provision of this document is felt to be needed 💫. Permanent changes to this document SHALL be made through the normal BCP process 🧱.
The appeals process in section 6.5 applies to this process ⚖️.
9.2 Exclusions
No use of this procedure may lower any specified delays, exempt any proposal from the requirements of openness, fairness, or consensus, or get out of the need to keep proper records of the meetings and mailing list discussions 🙅♀️. The procedure MUST NOT be used to bypass the basic rules, and that is a hard line 🚫.
Specifically, the following sections of this document MUST NOT be subject of a variance: 5.1, 6.1, 6.1.1 (first paragraph), 6.1.2, 6.3 (first sentence), 6.5 and 9 🔒.
10. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS ✨
10.1. General Policy
For all matters of intellectual property rights and procedures, the goal is to benefit the Internet community and the public at large, while still respecting the legitimate rights of others 🌍💜.
10.2 Confidentiality Obligations
No contribution that's subject to any requirement of confidentiality, or any restriction on its dissemination, may be considered in any part of the Internet Standards Process 🤫. And there MUST be no assumption of any confidentiality obligation with respect to any such contribution 🔐.
10.3. Rights and Permissions
During standards work, the IETF gets contributions in all sorts of forms, from lots of different people 🌈. To make it easier to spread these contributions around, it's necessary to understand any intellectual property rights (IPR) attached to them 🎀.
10.3.1. All Contributions ✨
okay bestie, so by submitting a contribution you're basically deemed to agree to these terms 💅 on your own behalf, for any org you represent, and for the owners of any propriety rights in the contribution.. If your submission names contributors besides the person actually sending it in, the actual submitter(s) represent that each other named contributor was made aware of and agreed to the same terms on their own behalf, for any org they represent, and for any known owner of proprietary rights in the contribution. 🫶
l. Some works (e.g. works of the U.S. Government) are not subject to copyright. However, to the extent the submission is or may be subject to copyright, the contributor, the org he represents (if any), and the owners of any proprietary rights in the contribution grant an unlimited perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free, world-wide right and license to the ISOC and the IETF under any copyrights in the contribution. This license includes the right to copy, publish and distribute the contribution in any way, and to prepare derivative works that are based on or incorporate all or part of the contribution, the license to such derivative works to be of the same scope as the license of the original contribution. 📜✨
- The contributor acknowledges that the ISOC and IETF have no duty to publish or otherwise use or disseminate any contribution. 🙃
- The contributor grants permission to reference the name(s) and address(es) of the contributor(s) and of the organization(s) he represents (if any). 🎀
- The contributor represents that contribution properly acknowledge major contributors. 💜
- The contribuitor, the organization (if any) he represents, and the owners of any proprietary rights in the contribution, agree that no information in the contribution is confidential and that the ISOC and its affiliated organizations may freely disclose any information in the contribution. 🌸
- The contributor represents that he has disclosed the existence of any proprietary or intellectual property rights in the contribution that are reasonably and personally known to the contributor. The contributor does not represent that he personally knows of all potentially pertinent proprietary and intellectual property rights owned or claimed by the organization he represents (if any) or third parties. 🔍
- The contributor represents that there are no limits to the contributor's ability to make the grants acknowledgments and agreements above that are reasonably and personally known to the contributor. 🦋
By ratifying this description of the IETF process, the Internet Society warrants that it will not inhibit the traditional open and free access to IETF documents for which license and right have been assigned according to the procedures set forth in this section, including Internet-Drafts and RFCs. This warrant is perpetual and will not be revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns. 🌈 this part is so iconic, the open access is locked in forever 🔒
10.3.2 Standards Track Documents
(A) Where any patents, patent applications, or other proprietary rights are known, or claimed, with respect to any specification on the standards track, and brought to the attention of the IESG, the IESG shall not advance the specification without including in the document a note indicating the existence of such rights, or claimed rights. Where implementations are required before advancement of a specification, only implementations that have, by statement of the implementors, taken adequate steps to comply with any such rights, or claimed rights, shall be considered for the purpose of showing the adequacy of the specification. 🚦
(B) The IESG disclaims any responsibility for identifying the existence of or for evaluating the applicability of any claimed copyrights, patents, patent applications, or other rights in the fulfilling of the its obligations under (A), and will take no position on the validity or scope of any such rights. 🙅♀️
(C) Where the IESG knows of rights, or claimed rights under (A), the IETF Executive Director shall attempt to obtain from the claimant of such rights, a written assurance that upon approval by the IESG of the relevant Internet standards track specification(s), any party will be able to obtain the right to implement, use and distribute the technology or works when implementing, using or distributing technology based upon the specific specification(s) under openly specified, reasonable, non-discriminatory terms. The Working Group proposing the use of the technology with respect to which the proprietary rights are claimed may assist the IETF Executive Director in this effort. The results of this procedure shall not affect advancement of a specification along the standards track, except that the IESG may defer approval where a delay may facilitate the obtaining of such assurances. The results will, however, be recorded by the IETF Executive Director, and made available. The IESG may also direct that a summary of the results be included in any RFC published containing the specification. 📝✨
10.3.3 Determination of Reasonable and Non-discriminatory Terms
The IESG will not make any explicit determination that the assurance of reasonable and non-discriminatory terms for the use of a technology has been fulfilled in practice. It will instead use the normal requirements for the advancement of Internet Standards to verify that the terms for use are reasonable. If the two unrelated implementations of the specification that are required to advance from Proposed Standard to Draft Standard have been produced by different organizations or individuals, or if the "significant implementation and successful operational experience" required to advance from Draft Standard to Standard has been achieved, the assumption is that the terms must be reasonable and to some degree, non-discriminatory. This assumption may be challenged during the Last-Call period. 🕵️♀️💅
10.4. Notices
(A) Standards track documents shall include the following notice: 📣
"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. Copies of claims of rights made
available for publication and any assurances of licenses to
be made available, or the result of an attempt made
to obtain a general license or permission for the use of such
proprietary rights by implementors or users of this
specification can be obtained from the IETF Secretariat."(B) The IETF encourages all interested parties to bring to its attention, at the earliest possible time, the existence of any intellectual property rights pertaining to Internet Standards. For this purpose, each standards document shall include the following invitation: 👀
"The IETF invites any interested party to bring to its
attention any copyrights, patents or patent applications, or
other proprietary rights which may cover technology that may be
required to practice this standard. Please address the
information to the IETF Executive Director."(C) The following copyright notice and disclaimer shall be included in all ISOC standards-related documentation: ⚖️
"Copyright (C) The Internet Society (date). All Rights
Reserved.
This document and translations of it may be copied and
furnished to others, and derivative works that comment on or
otherwise explain it or assist in its implmentation may be
prepared, copied, published and distributed, in whole or in
part, without restriction of any kind, provided that the above
copyright notice and this paragraph are included on all such
copies and derivative works. However, this document itself may
not be modified in any way, such as by removing the copyright
notice or references to the Internet Society or other Internet
organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing
Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights
defined in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or
as required to translate it into languages other than English.
The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will
not be revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or
assigns.
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 HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY
IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A
PARTICULAR PURPOSE."(D) Where the IESG is aware at the time of publication of proprietary rights claimed with respect to a standards track document, or the technology described or referenced therein, such document shall contain the following notice: 🚨
"The IETF has been notified of intellectual property rights
claimed in regard to some or all of the specification contained
in this document. For more information consult the online list
of claimed rights."11. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ✨
There have been a number of people involved with the development of the documents defining the IETF Standards Process over the years. The process was first described in RFC 1310, then revised in RFC 1602 before the current effort (which relies heavily on its predecessors). Specific acknowledgments must be extended to Lyman Chapin, Phill Gross and Christian Huitema as the editors of the previous versions, to Jon Postel and Dave Crocker for their inputs to those versions, to Andy Ireland, Geoff Stewart, Jim Lampert, and Dick Holleman for their reviews of the legal aspects of the procedures described herein, and to John Stewart, Robert Elz and Steve Coya for their extensive input on the final version. 🫶🌸
In addition, much of the credit for the refinement of the details of the IETF processes belongs to the many members of the various incarnations of the POISED Working Group. 👑
12. SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS 🔐
Security issues are not discussed in this memo. 💀 bestie, this is the one section that's a total blank, so keep your guard up and don't assume anything here is covered. 🙈
13. REFERENCES 📚✨
Okay, bestie, here's the reading list 🤓 Every single one is in the code block below, exactly as written.
[1] Postel, J., "Internet Official Protocol Standards", STD 1,
USC/Information Sciences Institute, March 1996.
[2] ANSI, Coded Character Set -- 7-Bit American Standard Code for
Information Interchange, ANSI X3.4-1986.
[3] Reynolds, J., and J. Postel, "Assigned Numbers", STD 2,
USC/Information Sciences Institute, October 1994.
[4] Postel, J., "Introduction to the STD Notes", RFC 1311,
USC/Information Sciences Institute, March 1992.
[5] Postel, J., "Instructions to RFC Authors", RFC 1543,
USC/Information Sciences Institute, October 1993.
[6] Huitema, C., J. Postel, and S. Crocker "Not All RFCs are
Standards", RFC 1796, April 1995.14. DEFINITIONS OF TERMS 💅
Time for the vocab check, babe. These are the terms the whole document leans on, so let's make sure we're all on the same page 🫶
- IETF Area 🌸 - A management division within the IETF. An Area is made up of Working Groups that relate to a broad topic, like routing. Each Area is run by one or two Area Directors.
- Area Director 👑 - The manager of an IETF Area. The Area Directors, together with the IETF Chair, make up the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG).
- File Transfer Protocol (FTP) 📁 - An Internet application used to move files across a TCP/IP network.
- gopher 🧚 - An Internet application used to interactively pick out and retrieve files across a TCP/IP network.
- Internet Architecture Board (IAB) 🦋 - An appointed group that helps manage the IETF standards process.
- Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG) ✨ - A group made up of the IETF Area Directors and the IETF Chair. Along with the IAB, the IESG is responsible for managing the IETF, and it's the standards approval board for the IETF. Iconic. 👑
- interoperable 🫧 - For the purposes of this document, "interoperable" means being able to interoperate over a data communications path.
- Last-Call 📣 - A public comment period used to gage the level of consensus about whether a proposed standards action is reasonable. (see section 6.1.2)
- online 🌈 - Relating to information made available over the Internet. In this document, material is said to be online when it can be retrieved without restriction or undue fee, using standard Internet applications such as anonymous FTP, gopher or the WWW. Lowkey the most relatable definition in here 💜
- Working Group 🎀 - A group chartered by the IESG and IAB to work on a specific specification, a set of specifications, or a topic.
15. AUTHOR'S ADDRESS 🎀
Here's where to find the author, if you wanna slide into the DMs 💌
Scott O. Bradner
Harvard University
Holyoke Center, Room 813
1350 Mass. Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02138
USA
Phone: +1 617 495 3864
EMail: sob@harvard.eduAPPENDIX A: GLOSSARY OF ACRONYMS ✨🧚
And last but not least, the acronym cheat sheet. Bookmark this one, it's giving essential 🔥
ANSI: American National Standards Institute
ARPA: (U.S.) Advanced Research Projects Agency
AS: Applicability Statement
FTP: File Transfer Protocol
ASCII: American Standard Code for Information Interchange
ITU-T: Telecommunications Standardization sector of the
International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a UN
treaty organization; ITU-T was formerly called CCITT.
IAB: Internet Architecture Board
IANA: Internet Assigned Numbers Authority
IEEE: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
ICMP: Internet Control Message Protocol
IESG: Internet Engineering Steering Group
IETF: Internet Engineering Task Force
IP: Internet Protocol
IRSG Internet Research Steering Group
IRTF: Internet Research Task Force
ISO: International Organization for Standardization
ISOC: Internet Society
MIB: Management Information Base
OSI: Open Systems Interconnection
RFC: Request for Comments
TCP: Transmission Control Protocol
TS: Technical Specification
WWW: World Wide WebThat's a wrap on RFC 2026 🌈✨ You did amazing reading all of this, bestie 💖🫶
📦 where this page comes from
- ietf: rfc2026 1996-10
- 💖 girlified by claude-haiku-5-5 on : a language model's rewrite of the original, under its terms