RFC 8700
Fifty Years of RFCs
Hmm, the environment notes about downloaded files and shell setup aren't something I need to act on here. This request is just the RFC 8700 rewrite, so I'll get straight to part 1.
RFC 8700: Fifty Years of RFCs 🎀
Okay so bestie, this one is the big birthday episode for the RFC Series! 🎂✨ It's written by H. Flanagan, Ed. from the RFC Editor, published by the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) in December 2019. It's Informational (so not a standards-track spec, no cap) 📖, and it updates RFC 2555 and RFC 5540. Nothing is obsoleted here, babe. 💅
Abstract 🌸
Okay so this RFC marks the fiftieth anniversary of the RFC Series, and it's giving retrospective 🕰️. It has memories from people who were there at the key turning points, plus a look at where things stand right now. It ends with some thoughts on what the next fifty years could look like for the Series. And it updates the perspectives in RFCs 2555 and 5540. 🦋
Status of This Memo 📝
Okay, quick legal-ish bit, so you know what this is: it is not an Internet Standards Track specification, it's just published for informational purposes 🧚. It's a product of the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), and the IAB decided it's valuable enough to keep on the permanent record. It reflects the consensus of the IAB. Documents the IAB approves for publication are not candidates for any level of Internet Standard 🙈. See Section 2 of RFC 7841 if you want the receipts.
Info about the current status of this document, any errata, and how to send feedback lives at https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8700 💜.
Copyright Notice ©️
Copyright (c) 2019 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. 🫶
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) as they were on the publication date. Please actually read those, bestie, because they spell out your rights and restrictions for this document 📜.
Table of Contents 🗂️
1. Introduction
2. Key Moments in RFC History
3. Perspectives
3.1. The Origins of RFCs - by Stephen D. Crocker
3.2. The RFC Management and Editing Team - by Vint Cerf
3.3. Formalizing the RFC Editor Model - by Leslie Daigle
3.4. The Continuation, or Creation, of a Stream - by Nevil
Brownlee
3.5. A View from inside the RFC Editor - by Sandy Ginoza
4. The Next Fifty Years of RFCs
4.1. Preservation
4.2. Evolution of the RFC Format
4.3. Stream Structure
5. Conclusion
6. IANA Considerations
7. Security Considerations
8. Informative References
IAB Members at the Time of Approval
Acknowledgements
Contributors
Author's Address1. Introduction 🌈
Okay so the RFC Series kicked off in April 1969 with "Host Software" by Steve Crocker 🧑💻. The early RFCs were basically requests for comments on ideas and proposals. The whole point was to start conversations, not to make an archival record of a standard or best practice 💬. That goal shifted over time, as the publication process got more formal and the community reading these things grew. Today over 8500 RFCs have been published, and they cover best practice guidance, experimental protocols, informational stuff, and, obviously, Internet standards ✨. Material comes in through the IETF, the IAB, the IRTF, and the Independent Submissions streams, and each one has its own clear process for how drafts get submitted and possibly approved as an RFC 📬. Ultimately the goal of the Series is to be a canonical source for the material the RFC Editor publishes and to keep that material preserved forever 🦋.
The RFC Editor role showed up a few years after the first RFC was published. Nobody knows exactly when the term "RFC Editor" was first used, but [RFC0902] formalized it in July 1984. Jon Postel, the first RFC Editor, defined the role through what he did, and later by writing down the initial publication processes 🫡. What we do know is that the RFC Editor's goal is to produce documents that are readable, clear, consistent, and reasonably uniform, and to keep the archival record of what's been published intact 💅.
Change does come to the Series, just slowly 🐢. First the distribution method went from postal mail to FTP and then to email 📮. RFCs couldn't be distributed electronically at the start, because the means to do that weren't defined until years after the first RFC was "published". Some early RFCs weren't even made electronically; some were handwritten or typed on a typewriter ⌨️. Eventually the creation process got more structured, and authors were given guidance on how to write an RFC. The editorial work went from Steve Crocker to a more official model with a designated editor, Jon Postel, and then to a team of five to seven people 👯. The actual editing and publishing work got split off from the service that registers protocol code points. The whole RFC Editor structure was reviewed [RFC4844], refined [RFC5620], and refined again [RFC6635] 🔁. And in the last few years, the process for changing the format of RFC documents themselves has started [RFC7990] 🎀.
This is evolution, babe 🦎, and the Series will keep adapting to meet the needs and expectations of the implementers, operators, historians, and community of authors who use it. Those changes always get balanced against the core mission of the Series: to maintain a strong, stable, archival record of technical specifications, protocols, and other information relevant to the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) and Internet networking communities 🏛️.
There's way more history here than this document can cover 📚. If you want earlier perspectives, these RFCs are iconic 👑. They focus on the huge contributions of Jon Postel, Czar of Socket Numbers [RFC0433] and first RFC Editor:
- [RFC2441] "Working with Jon, Tribute delivered at UCLA, October 30, 1998"
- [RFC2555] "30 Years of RFCs"
- [RFC5540] "40 Years of RFCs"
In this document, the history is told through the eyes of several people who helped shape it 👀. Stories like these only give a limited perspective. There are almost certainly other viewpoints, memories, and takes on events that are just as valid and would tell a different history 🌸. So these retrospectives are super valuable and give real insight into what was happening, but they're just one lens on the RFC Series, not the whole picture 🔍.
Steve Crocker, author of [RFC0001], shares his thoughts on how and why the Series began 🌱. Leslie Daigle, a major influence on the RFC Editor model, shares her view on the shift to a stronger, contracted function 💼. Nevil Brownlee, Independent Submissions Editor from 2010 through February 2018, shares his take on the clarification of the Independent Stream (IS) and its transition when Bob Braden retired from the role 🫶. And as the current RFC Series Editor, I (that's me, H. Flanagan 💖) am going to share my thoughts on the most recent changes to formalizing the digital preservation of the Series, the process to modernize the format while still respecting the need for stability, and my hopes for the next fifty years of RFCs 🚀.
This document updates the perspectives offered in [RFC2555] and [RFC5540] 🦋.
(Part 1 of 8. More parts coming, so stay tuned, bestie! 💅🎀)
2. Key Moments in RFC History ✨
okay bestie, here's the RFC timeline 🕰️💖 every row is a main character moment, and the table is kinda iconic ngl 💅
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| Marker | Date | Event |
+====================+==========+===================================+
| [RFC0001] | April | First RFC published |
| | 1969 | |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC0114] | April | First distribution of RFCs |
| | 1971 | over the network |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC0433] | December | First mention of the Czar of |
| | 1972 | Socket Numbers and the |
| | | proposal for a formal |
| | | registry |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC0690] | June | Relationship starts between |
| | 1975 | the Information Sciences |
| | | Institute (ISI) and the RFC |
| | | Editor (judging by Jon |
| | | Postel's affiliation change) |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC0748] | April | First April 1st RFC |
| | 1977 | published |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [IETF1] | January | First Internet Engineering |
| | 1986 | Task Force (IETF) meeting |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [IAB-19880712] | July | IAB approved the creation of |
| | 1988 | an Internet-Draft series |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC1122][RFC1123] | December | First major effort to review |
| | 1988 | key specifications and write |
| | | applicability statements |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC1083] | October | Three-stage standards |
| | 1989 | process first defined |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC1150] | March | FYI sub-series started |
| | 1990 | |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC1311] | March | STD sub-series started |
| | 1992 | |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC1818] | August | BCP sub-series started |
| | 1995 | |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC-ONLINE] | approx. | RFC Online Project to |
| | 1998 | restore early RFCs that were |
| | | "lost" started |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC2441] | 15 | Jon Postel's death |
| | October | |
| | 1998 | |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC4844] | July | RFC Series administrative |
| | 2007 | structure documented |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC4846] | July | Independent Submission |
| | 2007 | document stream is |
| | | formalized |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC5620] | August | RFC Editor organization |
| | 2009 | officially established as |
| | | RFC Series Editor, |
| | | Independent Submission |
| | | Editor, RFC Production |
| | | Center, and RFC Publisher |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [ISI-to-AMS] | October | Transition of RFC Production |
| | 2009 | Center and RFC Publisher |
| | | starts from Information |
| | | Sciences Institute (ISI) to |
| | | Association Management |
| | | Solutions (AMS) |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC5540] | January | Bob Braden retires from RFC |
| | 2010 | Editor |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC5743] | December | Internet Research Task Force |
| | 2009 | document stream formalized |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC-ONLINE] | approx. | RFC Online Project to |
| | 2010 | restore early RFCs that were |
| | | "lost" finished |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC6360] | August | FYI sub-series ended |
| | 2011 | |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC6410] | October | Two-stage standards process |
| | 2011 | formalized |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC6635] | June | Updated responsibilities of |
| | 2012 | RFC Series allocated to RFC |
| | | Series Editor, RFC |
| | | Production Center, and RFC |
| | | Publisher |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC6949] | May 2013 | RFC format change project |
| | | started |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
| [RFC8153] | April | RFCs no longer printed to |
| | 2017 | paper upon publication |
+--------------------+----------+-----------------------------------+
Table 1: Key Moments in RFC History3. Perspectives 🌸
3.1. The Origins of RFCs - by Stephen D. Crocker 🧚
okay so this one is a revamp of stuff Stephen Crocker wrote more than 30 years ago in [RFC1000] 💜 the vibes are immaculate 🫶
the internet is now millions of nodes and billions of users, and it all started with the ARPANET, which was once just a gleam in the eyes of J. C. R. Licklider, Bob Taylor, and Larry Roberts of the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) 🦋 most of the development went according to plan, but the original protocol design and the whole creation of the RFCs were honestly kind of accidental, no cap 😭
the ARPANET procurement kicked off in the summer of 1968. remember Vietnam, flower children, etc.? 🌈 there had been earlier experiments at various ARPA sites to link computer systems together, but this was the first version to explore packet switching as a core part of the communication strategy ✨ ("ARPA" didn't turn into "DARPA" (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) until 1972, then it briefly went back to ARPA in 1993 and then flipped back to DARPA again, iykyk 💀) the government's Request for Quotations (RFQ) asked for four packet-switching devices called Interface Message Processors ("IMPs") to be delivered to four sites out west: University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA); SRI International (Stanford Research Institute) in Menlo Park, CA; University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB); and the University of Utah in Salt Lake City 🍓 those sites ran a Scientific Data Systems (SDS) Sigma 7, an SDS 940, an IBM 360/75, and a DEC PDP-10, respectively 🎀 and the machines didn't just have different operating systems, even stuff like character sets and byte sizes was all over the place 🙈 other sites would add even more variations, periodt.
the focus was on the basic movement of data 💅 how the ARPANET would actually be used wasn't spelled out in advance, so the research community had to take some initiative ✨ to get things rolling, a meeting was called in August 1968 with reps from the chosen sites, chaired by Elmer Shapiro from SRI 🌟 going off Shapiro's notes, the attendees were Dave Hopper and Jeff Rulifson from SRI; Glen Culler and Gordon Buck from Santa Barbara; R. Stephenson, C. Stephen Carr, and W. Boam from Utah; Vint Cerf and me from UCLA; plus a few others from potential future sites 🫶
that first meeting was seminal, bestie 😭 we had SO many questions. how would IMPs and "hosts" (I think that was the first time I ever heard that term) be connected? what would hosts say to each other? what applications would be supported? the only concrete answers were remote login as a replacement for dial-up, telephone-based interactive terminal access, and file transfer, but we knew the vision had to be way bigger 🚀 we imagined everything: interactive graphics, cooperating processes, automatic database query, electronic mail, etc. but nobody knew where to begin 🤷♀️ we weren't even sure we had room to think hard about these problems, because surely someone senior and in charge, probably from the East, would show up eventually to bring the word 👑 but we did land on one conclusion: we ought to meet again. over the next several months we met at each of our sites, which set the precedent for regular face-to-face meetings 🍓 we also instantly felt the irony, because this new network was supposed to make it possible to work together at a distance, and the first thing we did was schedule a significant amount of travel 💀
over the next several months, a small, fairly consistent group of graduate students and staff members from the first four sites kept meeting 🌸 we used the term Network Working Group (NWG) to call ourselves. Elmer Shapiro had used that same term when he convened our first meeting, but until then it referred to the principal investigators and ARPA personnel, the senior people who had been planning the network 👀 our group was junior and disjointed from that prior group, except, of course, that each of us worked for one of the principal investigators 🦋
3.2. The RFC Management and Editing Team - by Vint Cerf 🎀
okay so bestie, as Steve mentioned in Section 3.1 🦋, Jon Postel took over as RFC manager in 1971 when Steve left UCLA for ARPA. And Jon didn't just add it to his plate, because he was also the "numbers Czar" 👑💅 obsessed, honestly.
At first, his focus was mostly on assigning RFC numbers to aspiring writers 🍓 But as the standardization of the ARPANET and Internet protocols kept going full speed ahead ✨, he started working in an editorial capacity 📝. He was an accomplished software engineer, so he had opinions about the technical content too, not just the writing style 🤓. And he was NOT shy about using his editorial discretion when would-be published authors brought their offerings for his scrutiny. Iconic, no notes 💀.
As the load increased, he recruited additional "volunteer" talent 🫶, most notably Joyce K. Reynolds, a fellow researcher at USC/ISI 🌸. Over the years, he also drafted Robert (Bob) Braden onto the team 🧚. Then when Jon unexpectedly passed away in October 1998 (see [RFC2468]) 🥀, Joyce and Bob carried on with the RFC work in his stead, adding Sandy Ginoza to the team 💜.
Lowkey my favourite detail: while Jon and Joyce were working closely together, Joyce would challenge me to tell which edits had been made by Jon and which by her. I found it impossible 🙈, because they were so aligned in their editorial sensibilities. The vibes were immaculate 🫠.
Sadly, three of these tireless Internauts have passed on 🌈. All we have now is the product of their joint work, plus Sandy Ginoza's and others' corporate memory, to recall history 📚🫶.
3.3. Formalizing the RFC Editor Model - by Leslie Daigle ✨
okay so Leslie is about to explain the behind-the-scenes drama 🎀 She was the chair of the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), the board in charge of general oversight of the RFC Series, right at a major turning point for all the Internet's technical institutions. To get why they had to do what they did, she first paints the bigger picture of how these institutions came to be 🦋
Like lots of people in decision-making roles in the mid '00s, she wasn't around when the Internet was born 🌸 The lore that got passed down to her is that the brilliant researchers who built the core specs and set the direction of the Internet had individuals stepping up to handle the roles needed to keep spec development organized and open. As the amount of specification work grew, those people were mostly backed by organizations that kept the same spirit going. The big name here is Jon Postel, who managed the allocation and assignment of names and numbers and also worked as the editor of RFCs. There were also individuals and institutions supporting the IETF's Secretariat function 💖 By the late 20th century, though, even that setup was getting thin 😭 The support functions were growing, and organizations just couldn't donate even more resources to run them. And with IANA in particular, there was a ton of industry and international dependence on the function and on its neutrality 👑
The IETF had also grown in size, stature, and commercial reliance 🚀 This system of institutional pieces "flying in formation" wasn't giving the IETF the kind of contractual regularity or integrated development it needed. People who hadn't been around while these institutions were developing, including IETF decision makers, didn't innately get why things "had to be the way they were." They got frustrated when they tried to update individual systems for new requirements or to better integrate them across all the different activities 🙄
Internet engineering had grown past the point where it could be supported by a loosely coupled set of organizations made up of people who'd been there since the beginning and knew each other well 🫶 New forms of governance were needed, along with a rationalized funding model. The IANA function was absorbed into a purpose-built international not-for-profit organization 🌈 The IETF stepped up to manage its own organizational destiny by creating the IETF Administrative Support Activity (IASA), and the Secretariat became one of its contracted functions. Iconic glow-up behavior 💅
That left the RFC Editor function as an independent effort, supported by the Internet Society ✨
That independence was necessary for the historic role of the RFC Series in considering all technical contributions. But at that inflection point in the Series' history, it needed a new governance and funding model, just like the other organizations supporting Internet technical specification had. The IETF leadership also had some concerns they felt needed addressing in its own technical publication stream 🧚 The RFC Series had been set up before there was an IETF, and it had historically kept documents that didn't come from the IETF. Still, the IETF was its largest and most organized contributor. There wasn't any particular organization of independent contributors 🤷♀️ And the funding for the RFC Editor was coming from the Internet Society under the banner of "support for the IETF." So for people who hadn't been involved from the start, it was super easy to see the RFC Series as uniquely the IETF's publication series. The challenge was to deal with the IETF's issues, plus governance and funding, without wrecking the fundamental nature of the RFC Series as a publication series that's bigger than just the IETF 🌸
Now for the tensions 👀 The one phrase that stuck in Leslie's mind from those discussions was "push to publish." Some folks in IETF leadership felt it would seriously cut costs and improve timeliness if an RFC could be published by literally pushing a button on a web interface the moment the IESG approved it 🔥 They also argued it would remove spec issues being introduced by copy editors. Those copy editors were hired as occasional workers to help improve publication rates, but they weren't necessarily up to speed on the terms of art in technical specs 💀 (Leslie says there were some pretty egregious examples of copy editors changing the technical meaning of the text, which she won't name here. Let's just say it wasn't strictly a case of Internet engineers getting uptight about their cheese being moved 🧀😤) "Push to publish" would have fixed those issues, but it wouldn't have fixed the loss of clarity from the many significant text improvements copy editors successfully made, or the fact that not all RFCs are approved by the IESG 🫠
Institutionally, the goal was clear: keep governance of the RFC Editor function within reach of the Internet technical community (and not any single private organization), without tying it specifically to the IETF 🦋 That was reasonably achievable by making sure the resulting pieces were set up under the oversight of the IAB. And the IAB is independent of the IETF, even though it's supported by the IASA organization 💜
The IETF worked on a document outlining functional requirements for its technical specification publication 📝 It could have been useful for setting up its own series, but it also helped people realize how hard document publishing is (it always looks easy when you haven't thought about it 🙈). It also laid the groundwork for dialogue with the RFC Editor. That requirements document was published as [RFC4714], an Informational RFC that still stands today to provide guidance on the editing processes surrounding IETF publications 🎀
There was still a certain lack of clarity about who was responsible for making decisions and changes in the RFC Series itself 😬 So Leslie and the IAB worked with the various involved parties to produce [RFC4844]. That document captured the RFC Series mission (one with a purpose greater than IETF technical specification publication) along with the roles and responsibilities of everyone involved 🌈 The RFC Editor is responsible for making sure that mission gets implemented. The IAB keeps its oversight responsibilities, including policy oversight, and it could act on that by changing the person or organization in the RFC Editor role 👑 At the same time, operational oversight moved over to the IASA support function of the IETF (and IAB) ✨
The discussions, and the resulting publication of [RFC4844], gave much greater visibility into and commitment to the RFC Series as a general Internet publication 💖 It also meant later adjustments could be made as requirements evolved, because the responsible parties are clearly identified. Main character energy for good governance 🫶
3.4. The Continuation, or Creation, of a Stream - by Nevil Brownlee ✨
Okay bestie, story time with Nevil! 🦋 Arguably it all starts in 2006 with [RFC4714], when the IAB and the IETF community spent part of the mid-'00s reworking the structure of the RFC Series 🌸. That included figuring out how the groups that publish into the RFC Series (at first the IETF, the IAB [RFC4845], and the Independent Submissions Stream [RFC4846], and later the IRTF [RFC5743] too) would handle approving documents to be published as RFCs. In 2009 the IAB put out "RFC Editor Model (Version 1)" [RFC5620] 💅. In this model, a brand-new role was created inside the RFC Editor: the RFC Series Editor (RSE). This person oversees RFC publishing and development, but the process for approving documents for publication stays outside their job. Arguably this was a role long held by people like Jon Postel, Bob Braden, and Joyce Reynolds, but [RFC5620] defined the RFC Series Editor so it's clearly separate from the Independent Submissions Editor (ISE) 🫶.
Before 2009, the RFC Editor could accept "Independent" submissions from individuals and, if they were judged significant, publish them as RFCs. The Independent Stream was set up to keep that function going 🎀. From February 2010 through February 2018, I was the ISE, and after reading [RFC4846] I went on to develop the Independent Stream (IS) 💖.
First, I spent several days at the RFC Production Center at the Information Sciences Institute (ISI) in Marina Del Ray with the RFC Editor (Bob Braden), Sandy Ginoza, and Alice Hagens. The goal was to learn how RFCs were actually edited and published 📚. Every RFC reaches the Production Center as an Internet-Draft. They get copy edited until the edited version is approved by its authors (AUTH48). At any stage, authors can check their draft's status via the RFC Editor website 👀.
For the Independent Submissions, Bob kept a journal (a simple ASCII file) of his interactions with authors for every draft, indexed by the draft name 📝. Bob also entered the Independent drafts into the RFC Editor database so authors could track their draft's status. After my few days with his team at ISI, he handed that journal (covering about 30 drafts) over to me and said, "Now it's over to you!" 😭🫶
I started by following in Bob's footsteps, keeping a journal and tracking each draft's status in the RFC Editor database 🌈. My first big thought was that every serious Internet-Draft submitted needed several careful reviews. Back then, if the ISE knew of suitable reviewers, they could simply ask them. Otherwise, if the draft related to an IETF or IRTF Working Group, the ISE could ask Working Group Chairs or Area Directors to suggest reviewers. The Independent Submissions Editorial Board (Ed Board) was another place the ISE could request reviewers from. Honestly, most of the people I approached were happy to help 🥹💜.
Most drafts were straightforward, but some needed extra attention ⭐. A draft often requested IANA code points, and for that, IANA was always quick to offer help and support 🙌. Code points in some IANA registries require Expert Review [RFC8126], and sometimes the interactions with Expert Reviewers took quite a long time 💀. Also, sometimes a draft seemed to fit better in the IETF Stream. For those, I would suggest that the draft authors try to find an Area Director to sponsor their work as an individual submission to the IETF Stream 🧚.
After my first few years as ISE, the IETF Tools Team developed the Datatracker [DATATRACKER] to show draft status and handle all the "housekeeping" tasks for all of the streams 🍓. That's when I switched from the RFC Editor database to using the Datatracker 💅.
Once a draft has been reviewed and the authors have revised it in dialogue with their reviewers, the ISE must submit that draft to the IESG for an "IESG Review" [RFC5742]. Overall, each IS draft benefited from discussions (which were usually simple) with my Ed Board and the IESG 🫶. A (very) few were somewhat controversial. For those, I was able to work with the IESG to negotiate a suitable "IESG Statement" and/or an "ISE Statement" to make it clear why the ISE published the draft 🔥.
One rather special part of the Independent Stream is the April 1st RFCs 🙈. These are humorous RFCs that have no formal review and approval process. The authors have to send them directly to the ISE or the RFC Editor. Only a few can be published each year, and each one is reviewed by the ISE and the RSE. Bob Braden's criteria for April 1st drafts were:
- They must relate to the Internet (like all drafts).
- Their readers should reach the end of page two before realizing it is an April 1st RFC.
- They must actually be funny!
April 1st RFCs have a huge following, and the feedback from the Internet community on April 1st each year has been enthusiastic and super quick 🤣🌸.
159 RFCs were published in the Independent Stream during my eight years as ISE 🎉. Over those eight years, I worked with most of their authors and often met them at IETF meetings. That was a very rewarding experience for me, so I thank everyone who contributed 💖. I also worked with most of the IESG members during those eight years, and they all gave me a lot of helpful interaction 🦋. Lastly, I've always loved working with the RSE and all the staff of the RFC Production Center. The IETF as a whole is very lucky to have such an effective team of talented, professional staff 👑✨
3.5. A View from inside the RFC Editor - by Sandy Ginoza 💅🎀
Okay so Sandy's story is literally the best 🥹. When she joined ISI, shortly after Jon Postel passed away, the RFC Editor model we know today didn't exist yet 😭. (That model is defined in [RFC5620], which was later obsoleted by [RFC6548] and [RFC6635].) Back then the RFC Editor was ONE unit. There was no RSE, no Production Center, no Publisher, and no Independent Submissions Editor. Everything was handled by the "RFC Editor", which was made up of four people: Bob Braden, Joyce Reynolds, a part-time student programmer, and Sandy herself 🫶.
Bob gave the high-level guidance and reviewed Independent Submissions 👑. He was a researcher in "Div 7" (Networking) at ISI, and on paper he only had 10% of his time for the RFC Editor. Ngl, he put in way more than that to keep the Series running 💜. When processing times started getting longer, he jumped in wherever he could, and at one point he even NROFFed a couple of RFCs-to-be 🙈.
Joyce was a full-time ISI employee, but she was seriously multitasking 🌸. While making sure RFCs kept getting published, she was also a User Services Area Director, a keynote speaker about the Internet, and temporarily on loan to IANA for 50% of her time while IANA was getting set up after splitting off from ISI. The student programmer handled programming tasks as they came up, and at the time was in charge of parsing MIBs 🧚.
Sandy was a full-time staffer who had to learn the ropes FAST so RFCs wouldn't stop 😤. Her main jobs were managing the publication queue, formatting and preparing documents for Joyce's review, carrying out AUTH48 once Joyce finished her review, and publishing, indexing, and archiving the RFCs (both soft and hard copies) 💖.
The workload grew a LOT over the next few years 📈. As it did, the RFC Editor slowly grew its staff too. To understand how the team grew, let's look at the publication rates through history 🦋. The table below shows average annual publication rates during 5-year periods.
+-------------+--------------------+
| Years | Avg. Pubs per Year |
+=============+====================+
| 1969 - 1972 | 80 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 1973 - 1977 | 55 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 1978 - 1982 | 20 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 1983 - 1987 | 39 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 1988 - 1992 | 69 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 1993 - 1997 | 171 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 1998 - 2002 | 237 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 2003 - 2007 | 325 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 2008 - 2012 | 333 |
+-------------+--------------------+
| 2013 - 2017 | 295 |
+-------------+--------------------+
Table 2: Annual Publication RatesThe numbers jumped HARD in the '90s and onward 🚀. Publications almost doubled between 1993 and 2007, which is wild. Submissions passed the 300 mark for the first time in 2004 and hit an all-time high of 385 in 2011 🔥. They didn't dip below 300 again until 2016, when they came in at 284.
As submissions grew, so did the RFC Editor's growing pains 😭. Processing times started creeping up because the existing staff just couldn't keep up with the expanding queue. ISI tried bringing on temporary copy editors to shorten the training hump and to avoid permanently hiring people in case the submission burst was a fluke. The idea was that staff could be resized as needed 🌈. However, as Leslie noted, it didn't work very well 💀.
The experiment still had lasting effects, though ✨. It led to the version of the process we have now. The RFC Editor asks more questions during AUTH/AUTH48, and technical changes need approval from the relevant Area Directors or stream managers, depending on the document stream. All of this added to the workload and stretched out publication times. Lowkey, it's so relatable that people now jokingly call AUTH48 the authors' "48 days", "48 weeks", and so on 😂.
On top of the surge in submissions, the team also tested tools and went through several editorial process changes 🛠️. Because of the lesson learned with temporary copy editors, the team became more permanent. Other editors came and went in between, but two additions are super special 💜. Alice Russo joined in 2005 and Megan Ferguson joined in 2007. They lived through much of the RFC Editor's growing pains, helped the team climb out of a backlog, shaped the RFC Editor function, and are STILL on the team today 🫶.
Since the record-breaking submission numbers clearly weren't a fluke, the team made big upgrades to the infrastructure for tracking documents and reporting 📊. Some legends got retired here: the iconic "black binder" (an actual 3-ring binder used to track RFC number assignment), a manually edited HTML file for the queue page, and a Rube Goldberg set of text files and scripts that generated queue statistics. Eventually, all of them were replaced 😭. An errata system was proposed and implemented, and XML became a newly accepted source file 🎀.
In 2009, [RFC5620] was published, introducing the first version of the RFC Editor model we have now 💅. It was published in 2009, but it didn't take effect until 2010. That's when the RFC Editor project as Sandy knew it was disbanded and split into four pieces: the RFC Series Editor (RSE), the Independent Submissions Editor (ISE), the RFC Production Center (RPC), and the Publisher function 🦋. The RFC Series Advisory Group (RSAG) was also created to "provide expert, informed guidance (chiefly, to the RSE) in matters affecting the RFC Series operation and development" [RSAG] 👑.
In 2010, the RPC and Publisher contracts went to Association Management Solutions (AMS) 🎉. Three existing team members (Alice Russo, Megan Ferguson, and Sandy) started there, and they were thrilled to be joined by Lynne Bartholomew and Rebecca VanRheenen, new colleagues who anchored the team in the AMS office 🌸.
Sandy was honestly kinda wary of this new model 😬. She was especially worried about the hole Bob Braden's departure would leave. Luckily, Bob kept giving wise counsel and insight during the transition (and beyond) 🥺. He gave the staff moving over to AMS the most helpful parting words: "keep the RFCs coming". And that's exactly what they did 💖.
AMS totally embraced the RFC Series and helped the team get set up on new servers quickly 🖥️. The RPC and Publisher became part of the AMS family, and it was all hands on deck to make sure the transition was smooth and didn't mess up document processing 🙌.
During the transition, the team had two main goals 🎯. The first was to 1) keep the trains running. In other words, get up and running again with as little downtime as possible. The second was to 2) work with the Transitional RSE (a role that wrapped up before the transition ended), the ISE (Nevil Brownlee), RSAG, and the IETF Administrative Director (IAD) to really understand and implement the newly defined RFC Editor model 🧠.
Some parts of the transition were tough and took longer than anyone expected 😅. Still, the Acting RSE (Olaf Kolkman) officially passed the reins to the new RSE (Heather Flanagan) in 2012 🎀. Heather had a LOT on her plate. She had to jump in, learn the RFC Editor and IETF culture, and work through a backlog of issues that had been left unattended for ages 💪.
Two of those backlogged issues were SO old that someone had asked Sandy about them at her very first IETF meeting 🙈. The first: when would the RFC Editor allow non-ASCII characters in RFCs? The second: when would the RFC Editor adopt a more modern publication format?
At that point, the team totally got why people wanted broader character set support and more modern outputs 🌈. But they also kept getting emails from folks asking for plaintext files (instead of being pointed to the website) because their Internet access was limited 📩. There were also regular complaints from users of https://www.rfc-editor.org whenever something on the site didn't work with their older browsers 😩. Basically, they couldn't move forward without leaving a bunch of people behind 💔.
BUT, we're now standing right on the edge of change 🦋✨. The next few years are going to be so exciting for the RFC Series, as it moves from publishing plaintext, ASCII-only files to publishing multiple file formats (XML, HTML, PDF/A-3, and TXT) that allow both non-ASCII characters and SVG art 🎨.
Honestly, Sandy's observation is iconic: the RFC Editor has been in an almost constant state of change since she joined, and yet the goal has stayed exactly the same 💜. That goal is to produce archival quality RFCs in a timely manner that are easily accessible for future generations 🌟.
4. The Next Fifty Years of RFCs 🔮
As Steve Crocker mentioned, the Series started out valuing communication over formality and openness over structure 💖. The Internet has grown into a pervasive, global thing, and we still aim for openness and communication. But we also recognize that, for protocols and other information to support interoperability, there have to be points of stability to build from 🧱. Everyone is on the same footing here, from small-time app developers to multi-billion dollar companies 🤝. And anyone should be able to look back at a point in time and understand what was done and why 🕰️.
The informality has given way to more structure, but the openness and solid foundation the Series provides MUST keep going 💅. Wait, let me be clear: that's just the vibe, and it's totally what the original is getting at. So with that in mind, what does the future hold for the next fifty years of RFCs? 👀✨
4.1. Preservation 📚
The RFC Editor exists to edit, publish, and maintain an archive of documents published in the RFC Series 🗂️. But a proper digital archive is more than just saving RFCs to disk and making sure the disks are backed up 💾. Digital preservation has grown into a whole industry of its own, and it's honestly so impressive 🙌. "Digital Preservation Considerations for the RFC Series" [RFC8153] looks at what a digital archive means today and describes ways to support the archive into the future. It also recommends ways for the RFC Editor to take advantage of organizations that specialize in this field 🤓.
The future of digital preservation, as far as the RFC Series is concerned, has two big parts 🌈. First, finding new partners that can absorb and archive RFCs into a public, maintained digital archive. Second, reviewing the RFC format so that the published documents stay archivable according to whatever the industry best practice is over time 🦋.
4.2. Evolution of the RFC Format 🎀
okay so RFCs have been digital documents since super early in the Series, bestie 💻✨ They weren't always in US-ASCII, but that's been the canonical format for decades, and honestly? It's kind of wild that it has survived all that evolution and change 😭🫶
BUT (and this is a big but 🙈) US-ASCII just doesn't stretch far enough for what people expect today. Like, the whole world of online document presentation, consumption, and preservation was in some cases only invented years after the first RFC was published 🌸 People have argued, and fairly, that those newer fields and tools haven't had a chance to prove they're timeless yet. Still, the RFC Series Editor, working with the community, kicked off a serious push in 2012 to get the Series lined up with all these new possibilities for preservation and display 💅✨
If you want the full tea on the RFC format project and why these changes were needed, check out [RFC7990] 🦋 And the door is wide open for more changes down the road, since the archiving specs keep evolving and web development expectations keep leveling up 🚀💜
4.3. Stream Structure 🌈
okay this part is lowkey a identity crisis 😭 For a lot of people, especially inside the IETF, the RFC Series is the IETF. Like they're the same thing in their heads 🙈 The Series actually predates the IETF by eighteen years, but over time the IETF became the source of most documents sent to the RFC Editor for publication 📚✨
Here's where it gets messy: the policies made for IETF Stream drafts tend to apply across all four document streams 👀 And the publication tools? They mostly focus on the IETF as their main audience. So it's genuinely hard for people to see how, or even why, there's a difference between the Series and the IETF 💀
And the question is getting louder, not quieter 📣 What's the future of the Series? If people can't tell where the IETF ends and the Series begins, should we treat that difference as an artificial one and just declare them the same entity? 🤔🎀
This is something the community gets to decide ✨ Conversations are already underway to think through what the possible changes would mean, so stay tuned, bestie 🫶
5. Conclusion 🦋
okay big picture time 🌸 As the Internet evolves, what people expect and what's possible evolve right alongside it. Over the next fifty years, the Series has to keep balancing two things: staying true to its original mission of publication and preservation, and staying relevant to the people who write and read RFCs 📚💖 That balancing act is a tension that the RFC Editor and the community have to work out together, and honestly, we will not run short of challenges 😤🔥
6. IANA Considerations 🧚
This document has no IANA actions. Nothing to see here for IANA, bestie 💅
7. Security Considerations 💀
This document has no security considerations. 🫶
8. Informative References 📚
[APPRENTICE]
Wikipedia, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice", December 2019,
<https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Sorcerer%2
7s_Apprentice&oldid=925824658>.
[DATATRACKER]
Internet Engineering Task Force, "IETF Datatracker",
<https://datatracker.ietf.org>.
[IAB-19880712]
IAB, "IAB Minutes 1988-07-12", July 1988,
<https://www.iab.org/documents/minutes/minutes-1988/iab-
minutes-1988-07-12/>.
[IETF1] The MITRE Corporation, "Proceedings of the 16-17 January
1986 DARPA Gateway Algorithms and Data Structures Task
Force", IETF 1, January 1986,
<https://www.ietf.org/old/2009/proceedings/prior29/
IETF01.pdf>.
[ISI-to-AMS]
IETF Administrative Support Activity (IASA), "RFC
Production Center Agreement between Association Management
Solutions, LLC and The Internet Society", October 2009,
<https://iaoc.ietf.org/documents/AMS-RPC-Public-Final-
2009.pdf>.
[RFC-ONLINE]
RFC Editor, "History of RFC Online Project", 2000,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc-online-2000.html>.
[RFC0001] Crocker, S., "Host Software", RFC 1, DOI 10.17487/RFC0001,
April 1969, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1>.
[RFC0003] Crocker, S., "Documentation conventions", RFC 3,
DOI 10.17487/RFC0003, April 1969,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc3>.
[RFC0114] Bhushan, A., "File Transfer Protocol", RFC 114,
DOI 10.17487/RFC0114, April 1971,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc114>.
[RFC0433] Postel, J., "Socket number list", RFC 433,
DOI 10.17487/RFC0433, December 1972,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc433>.
[RFC0690] Postel, J., "Comments on the proposed Host/IMP Protocol
changes", RFC 690, DOI 10.17487/RFC0690, June 1975,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc690>.
[RFC0748] Crispin, M., "Telnet randomly-lose option", RFC 748,
DOI 10.17487/RFC0748, April 1978,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc748>.
[RFC0902] Reynolds, J. and J. Postel, "ARPA Internet Protocol
policy", RFC 902, DOI 10.17487/RFC0902, July 1984,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc902>.
[RFC1000] Reynolds, J. and J. Postel, "Request For Comments
reference guide", RFC 1000, DOI 10.17487/RFC1000, August
1987, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1000>.
[RFC1083] Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Internet
Activities Board, "IAB official protocol standards",
RFC 1083, DOI 10.17487/RFC1083, December 1988,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1083>.
[RFC1122] Braden, R., Ed., "Requirements for Internet Hosts -
Communication Layers", STD 3, RFC 1122,
DOI 10.17487/RFC1122, October 1989,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1122>.
[RFC1123] Braden, R., Ed., "Requirements for Internet Hosts -
Application and Support", STD 3, RFC 1123,
DOI 10.17487/RFC1123, October 1989,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1123>.
[RFC1150] Malkin, G. and J. Reynolds, "FYI on FYI: Introduction to
the FYI Notes", RFC 1150, DOI 10.17487/RFC1150, March
1990, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1150>.
[RFC1311] Postel, J., "Introduction to the STD Notes", RFC 1311,
DOI 10.17487/RFC1311, March 1992,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1311>.
[RFC1818] Postel, J., Li, T., and Y. Rekhter, "Best Current
Practices", RFC 1818, DOI 10.17487/RFC1818, August 1995,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1818>.
[RFC2441] Cohen, D., "Working with Jon, Tribute delivered at UCLA,
October 30, 1998", RFC 2441, DOI 10.17487/RFC2441,
November 1998, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2441>.
[RFC2468] Cerf, V., "I REMEMBER IANA", RFC 2468,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2468, October 1998,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2468>.
[RFC2555] Editor, RFC. and et. al., "30 Years of RFCs", RFC 2555,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2555, April 1999,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2555>.
[RFC4714] Mankin, A. and S. Hayes, "Requirements for IETF Technical
Publication Service", RFC 4714, DOI 10.17487/RFC4714,
October 2006, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc4714>.
[RFC4844] Daigle, L., Ed. and Internet Architecture Board, "The RFC
Series and RFC Editor", RFC 4844, DOI 10.17487/RFC4844,
July 2007, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc4844>.
[RFC4845] Daigle, L., Ed. and Internet Architecture Board, "Process
for Publication of IAB RFCs", RFC 4845,
DOI 10.17487/RFC4845, July 2007,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc4845>.
[RFC4846] Klensin, J., Ed. and D. Thaler, Ed., "Independent
Submissions to the RFC Editor", RFC 4846,
DOI 10.17487/RFC4846, July 2007,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc4846>.
[RFC5540] Editor, RFC., "40 Years of RFCs", RFC 5540,
DOI 10.17487/RFC5540, April 2009,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5540>.
[RFC5620] Kolkman, O., Ed. and IAB, "RFC Editor Model (Version 1)",
RFC 5620, DOI 10.17487/RFC5620, August 2009,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5620>.
[RFC5742] Alvestrand, H. and R. Housley, "IESG Procedures for
Handling of Independent and IRTF Stream Submissions",
BCP 92, RFC 5742, DOI 10.17487/RFC5742, December 2009,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5742>.
[RFC5743] Falk, A., "Definition of an Internet Research Task Force
(IRTF) Document Stream", RFC 5743, DOI 10.17487/RFC5743,
December 2009, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5743>.
[RFC6360] Housley, R., "Conclusion of FYI RFC Sub-Series", RFC 6360,
DOI 10.17487/RFC6360, August 2011,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6360>.
[RFC6410] Housley, R., Crocker, D., and E. Burger, "Reducing the
Standards Track to Two Maturity Levels", BCP 9, RFC 6410,
DOI 10.17487/RFC6410, October 2011,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6410>.
[RFC6548] Brownlee, N., Ed. and IAB, "Independent Submission Editor
Model", RFC 6548, DOI 10.17487/RFC6548, June 2012,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6548>.
[RFC6635] Kolkman, O., Ed., Halpern, J., Ed., and IAB, "RFC Editor
Model (Version 2)", RFC 6635, DOI 10.17487/RFC6635, June
2012, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6635>.
[RFC6949] Flanagan, H. and N. Brownlee, "RFC Series Format
Requirements and Future Development", RFC 6949,
DOI 10.17487/RFC6949, May 2013,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6949>.
[RFC7990] Flanagan, H., "RFC Format Framework", RFC 7990,
DOI 10.17487/RFC7990, December 2016,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7990>.
[RFC8126] Cotton, M., Leiba, B., and T. Narten, "Guidelines for
Writing an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs", BCP 26,
RFC 8126, DOI 10.17487/RFC8126, June 2017,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8126>.
[RFC8153] Flanagan, H., "Digital Preservation Considerations for the
RFC Series", RFC 8153, DOI 10.17487/RFC8153, April 2017,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8153>.
[RSAG] RFC Editor, "RFC Series Advisory Group",
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/about/rsag/>.IAB Members at the Time of Approval 🌟
Here's the squad that was in the IAB when this got approved 👑
- Jari Arkko
- Alissa Cooper
- Stephen Farrell
- Wes Hardaker
- Ted Hardie
- Christian Huitema
- Zhenbin Li
- Erik Nordmark
- Mark Nottingham
- Melinda Shore
- Jeff Tantsura
- Martin Thomson
- Brian Trammell
Acknowledgements 🫶
Huge thank you to John Klensin for his feedback and insights on the history of the Series 💖 He directly engaged with and influenced a lot of the key people who built the RFC Series, so his perspective is gold ✨
Extra thanks to members of the RFC Series Advisory Group and the Independent Submissions Editorial Board, especially Scott Bradner, Brian Carpenter, and Adrian Farrel 🦋 They gave early reviews and input on the sequence of key moments in the Series' history, and that's iconic behaviour 👏
Contributors 🌸
Big love to Steve Crocker, Vint Cerf, Leslie Daigle, Nevil Brownlee, and Sandy Ginoza for sharing their perspectives on the Series and for their ongoing support 💜 Main character contributors, no notes 💅
Author's Address ✨
Heather Flanagan is the editor of this one, and she's with the RFC Editor 💅🎀
Her contact details, exactly as they appear:
- Email:
rse@rfc-editor.org - URI:
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2647-2220
That's the whole doc, bestie! 🦋🌸
📦 where this page comes from
- ietf: rfc8700 2019-12
- 💖 girlified by claude-haiku-5-5 on : a language model's rewrite of the original, under its terms