In internetworking and computer network engineering, Request for Comments (RFC) documents are a series of memoranda encompassing new research, innovations, and methodologies applicable to Internet technologies. Internetworking involves connecting two or more distinct computer networks together into an internetwork (often shortened to internet), using devices called routers to connect them together, to allow traffic to flow back and forth between them. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Engineering is the design, analysis, and/or construction of works for practical purposes. ... A memorandum or memo is a written form of communication most often employed in business environments. ...

Through the Internet Society, engineers and computer scientists may publish discourse in the form of an RFC memorandum, either for peer review or simply to convey new concepts, information, or (occasionally) engineering humor. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) adopts some of the proposals published in RFCs as Internet standards. The Internet Society or ISOC is an international organization that promotes Internet use and access. ... Discourse is a term used in semantics as in discourse analysis, but it also refers to a social conception of discourse, often linked with the work of French philosopher Michel Foucault (1926-1984) and Jürgen Habermas The Theory of Communicative Action (1985). ... A memorandum or memo is a written form of communication most often employed in business environments. ... Peer review (known as refereeing in some academic fields) is a scholarly process used in the publication of manuscripts and in the awarding of funding for research. ... The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops and promotes Internet standards, cooperating closely with the W3C and ISO/IEC standard bodies; and dealing in particular with standards of the TCP/IP and Internet protocol suite. ... An Internet standard is a specification for an innovative internetworking technology or methodology, which the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) ratified as an open standard after the innovation underwent peer review. ...

RFC production and evolution

The RFC Editor issues each RFC document with a unique serial number. Once issued a numerical identifier and published, an RFC is never rescinded or modified; if the document requires amendments, the authors publish a revised document; therefore, some RFCs make others obsolete. Together, the serialized RFCs compose a continuous historical record of the evolution of Internet standards. A serial number is a unique number that is one of a series assigned for identification which varies from its successor or predecessor by a fixed discrete integer value. ...

Note that the term "RFC" is not unique to this series. Several other organizations have published documents using the term "RFC". However, this is by far the best-known "RFC" series on the Internet.

The RFC production process differs from the standardization process of formal standards organizations such as ANSI. Internet technology experts may submit an Internet Draft without support from an external institution. Standards-track RFCs are published with approval from the IETF, and are usually produced by experts participating in working groups, which first publish an Internet Draft. This approach facilitates initial rounds of peer review before documents mature into RFCs. Standardization, in the context related to technologies and industries, is the process of establishing a technical standard among competing entities in a market, where this will bring benefits without hurting competition. ... The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) is a private, non-profit standards organization that produces industrial standards in the United States. ... Internet Drafts (IDs) are a series of documents published by the IETF. They are drafts for RFCs. ... The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops and promotes Internet standards, cooperating closely with the W3C and ISO/IEC standard bodies; and dealing in particular with standards of the TCP/IP and Internet protocol suite. ... An IETF working group, or WG for short, is a working group of the IETF. It operates on rough consensus, is open to all who want to participate, has discussions on an open mailing list, and may hold meetings at IETF meetings. ...

The RFC tradition of pragmatic, experience-driven, after-the-fact standards-authorship accomplished by individuals or small working groups has important advantages over the more formal, committee-driven process typical of ANSI or ISO. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is an international standard-setting body composed of representatives from national standards bodies. ...

Emblematic of some of these advantages is the existence of a flourishing tradition of joke RFCs. Usually at least one a year is published, usually on April Fool's Day. Every April 1st since 1989, the Internet Engineering Task Force has published one or more humorous RFC documents, following in the path blazed by the June 1973 RFC titled ARPAWOCKY. List RFC 527 - ARPAWOCKY R. Merryman, UCSD; 22 June 1973; a Lewis Carroll pastiche RFC 748 - Telnet randomly-lose option. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...

The RFCs define a network that has grown to truly worldwide proportions.

Most RFCs use a common set of keywords, such as "MUST" and "NOT RECOMMENDED" defined by RFC 2119, an Augmented Backus-Naur form (ABNF) defined RFC 4234 as a metalanguage, and simple, text-base formatting in order to keep the RFCs consistent and easy to understand. For more details about RFCs and the RFC process, see RFC 2026, "The Internet Standards Process, Revision 3". The Augmented Backus-Naur form (ABNF) extends the Backus-Naur form. ...

History

The inception of the RFC format occurred in 1969 as part of the seminal ARPANET project. Today, it is the official publication channel for the IETF, the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), and — to some extent — the global community of computer network researchers in general. For the Stargate SG-1 episode, see 1969 (Stargate SG-1). ... ARPANET logical map, March 1977. ... The Internet Architecture Board (IAB) is the committee charged with oversight of the technical and engineering development of the Internet by the Internet Society (ISOC). ...

The authors of the first RFCs typewrote their work and circulated hard copies among the ARPA researchers. Unlike the modern RFCs, many of the early RFCs were requests for comments. The RFC leaves questions open and is written in a less formal style. This less formal style is now typical of Internet Draft documents, the precursor step before being approved as an RFC. Mechanical desktop typewriters, such as this Underwood Five, were long time standards of government agencies, newsrooms, and sales offices. ... Hard Copy was a tabloid news infotainment magazine show similar to Inside Edition and A Current Affair. ... Internet Drafts (IDs) are a series of documents published by the IETF. They are drafts for RFCs. ...

In December of 1969, researchers began distributing new RFCs via the now-operational ARPANET. RFC 1, entitled "Host Software", was written by Steve Crocker of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and published on April 7, 1969. Crocker first drafted the document in his bathroom to avoid waking his roommate.^{[citation needed]} Although written by Steve Crocker, the RFC emerged from an early working group discussion between Steve Crocker, Steve Carr, Jeff Rulifson. (The document lists Bill Duvall as having attended only the final working group meeting prior to publication.) Steve Crocker is the author of several Request for Comments documents, including the very first RFC, and the April Fools RFC 1776. ... The University of California, Los Angeles, generally known as UCLA, is a public university whose main campus is located in the affluent Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. ... April 7 is the 97th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (98th in leap years). ... For the Stargate SG-1 episode, see 1969 (Stargate SG-1). ... A typical American bathroom A bathroom is a room that may have different functions depending on the cultural context. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with flatshare. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Johns F. (Jeff) Rulifson (born August 20, 1941) is a computer scientist largely known for his involvement at the Augmentation Research Center, at then-named Stanford Research Institute (now SRI International) in implementing the On-Line System (NLS), a system that foreshadowed many future developments in modern computing and networking. ...

In RFC 3, which first defined the RFC series, Steve Crocker started attributing the RFC series to the "Network Working Group". This group seems never to have had a formal existence, being rather defined as "this group of people", but the attribution remains on RFCs to this day.

Many of the subsequent RFCs of the 1970s also came from UCLA, not only because of the quality of the scholarship, but also because UCLA was one of the first Interface Message Processors (IMPs) on ARPANET. Template:A year The 1970s decade refers to the years from 1970 to 1979, inclusive. ... Scholarly method - or as it is more commonly called, scholarship - is the body of principles and practices used by scholars to make their claims about the world as valid and trustworthy as possible, and to make them known to the scholarly public. ... Leonard Kleinrock and the first IMP. Taken from http://www. ...

Douglas Engelbart's Augmentation Research Center (ARC) at Stanford Research Institute was another of the four first ARPANET nodes, as well as the first Network Information Centre, and (as noted by the sociologist Thierry Bardini) the source of a large number of early RFCs. Dr. Douglas C. Engelbart (born January 30, 1925 in Oregon) is an American inventor of German descent. ... Stanford Research Institutes Augmentation Research Center (ARC) was founded by electrical engineer Douglas Engelbart to develop and experiment with new tools and techniques for collaboration and information processing. ... SRI Internationals main campus on Ravenswood Avenue, Menlo Park, California SRI International is one of the worlds largest contract research institutions. ... A node is a device that is connected as part of a computer network. ... A Network Information Centre (NIC), also known as domain registry, is part of the Domain Name System of the Internet. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Thierry Bardini, a sociologist, is an associate professor in the Department of Communication at the Université de Montréal, Canada, where he co-directs the Workshop in Radical Empiricism (with Brian Massumi). ...

From 1969 until 1998, Jon Postel served as the RFC editor. Following the expiration of the original ARPANET contract with the U.S. federal government, the Internet Society (acting on behalf of the IETF) contracted with the Networking Division of the USC Information Sciences Institute to assume the editorship and publishing responsibilities (under the direction of the IAB). Jon Postel continued to serve as the RFC Editor until his death. Later, Bob Braden has taken over the role of project lead, while Joyce K. Reynolds has continued to be part of the team. 1998 (MCMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year of the Ocean [1]. // Coated in ice, power and telephone lines sag and often break, resulting in power outages. ... Jon Postel (Photo by Irene Fertik, USC News Service. ... Editing is the process of preparing language, images, or sound for presentation through correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications. ... The University of Southern California (commonly referred to as USC, SC, Southern California, and incorrectly as Southern Cal[4]), located in the University Park neighborhood in Los Angeles, California, USA, was founded in 1880, making it Californias oldest private research university. ... ÂÂThe Information Sciences Institute (ISI) of the University of Southern California is involved in a broad spectrum of information processing research and in the development of advanced computer and communication technologies. ... Robert Braden is an American computer scientist who played a role in the development of the Internet. ... Joyce K. Reynolds is a computer science professor who has been active in the development of the protocols underlying the Internet. ...

Obtaining RFCs

The official source for RFCs on the World Wide Web is the RFC Editor. Unofficially, they are obtainable from a multitude of mirrors accessible via the HyperText Transfer Protocol, anonymous FTP, the gopher protocol, and other prominent application layer protocols. WWWs historical logo designed by Robert Cailliau The World Wide Web (or simply the Web) is a system of interlinked, hypertext documents that runs over the Internet. ... Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is a method used to transfer or convey information on the World Wide Web. ... Anonymous FTP is a FTP server, which does not require user authorization. ... Gopher is a distributed document search and retrieval network protocol designed for the Internet. ... The application layer is the seventh level of the seven-layer OSI model. ... For other senses of this word, see protocol. ...

One may retrieve almost any individual, published RFC like RFC 3700 via the following URL example: http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc3700.txt Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is a technical, Web-related term used in two distinct meanings: in popular usage, it is a widespread synonym for Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) — many popular and technical texts will use the term URL when referring to URI; strictly, the idea of a uniform syntax for...

Every RFC is available as ASCII text, but may also be available in other file formats; however, as of 2006 the definitive version of any standards-track specification is the ASCII version. Note that RFC 1119 is not on standards track. There are 95 printable ASCII characters, numbered 32 to 126. ... A file format is a particular way to encode information for storage in a computer file. ... 2006 is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... An Internet standard is a specification for an innovative internetworking technology or methodology, which the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) ratified as an open standard after the innovation underwent peer review. ...

For easy access on the meta data of an RFC including abstract, keywords, author(s), publication date, errata, status, and especially later updates or replacements in human readable format the RFC Editor site offers a search form with many features. A redirection sets some efficient parameters, example: http://purl.net/net/rfc/3700

Status

Not every RFC is a standard. Only the IETF represented by the IESG can approve standards track RFCs, further divided into proposed (PS), draft (DS), and full Internet Standards (STD). The STD subseries has its own numbers; as of 2006 STD 1 is RFC 3700. Some STDs form small sets of more than one related RFC. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops and promotes Internet standards, cooperating closely with the W3C and ISO/IEC standard bodies; and dealing in particular with standards of the TCP/IP and Internet protocol suite. ... The Internet Engineering Steering Group is a body composed of the Internet Engineering Task Force Chair and Area Directors: Internet Area (int) Operations & Management Area (ops) Routing Area (rtg) Security Area (sec) Transport Area (tsv) Temporary Sub-IP Area (sub) and so on. ... An Internet standard is a specification for an innovative internetworking technology or methodology, which the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) ratified as an open standard after the innovation underwent peer review. ... 2006 is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

An experimental RFC can be an IETF document or an individual submission to the RFC Editor. In theory it's what the name suggests, in practice some documents aren't promoted on standards track because there are no volunteers for the procedural details. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops and promotes Internet standards, cooperating closely with the W3C and ISO/IEC standard bodies; and dealing in particular with standards of the TCP/IP and Internet protocol suite. ...

An informational RFC can be nearly anything from April 1st jokes over proprietary protocols up to widely recognized essential RFCs like RFC 1591. Some informational RFCs form the subseries "for your information" (FYI). While rarely added to today some old FYIs are still interesting, an example is FYI 18 aka RFC 1983, the "Internet User's Glossary". FYI 17 or "The Tao of IETF" is now RFC 4677 published in 2006.

A historic RFC is one that is obsoleted by a newer version, documents a protocol that is not considered interesting in the current Internet, or has been removed from the standards track for other reasons. Some obsolete RFCs are not classified as historic, because the "Internet Standards Process" generally doesn't allow normative references from a standards track RFC to another RFC with lower status. Also, not many people are interested in working through the required procedural details to get RFCs classified as historic and update all RFCs normatively depending on it.

Status unknown is used for very old RFCs, when it's unclear which status it would get if published today. In some cases those RFCs wouldn't be published at all – the early RFCs were often what the name says, simple "Requests for Comments" not intended to specify a protocol, administrative procedure, or anything else the RFC series is used for today.

The best common practice (BCP) subseries collects administrative documents and other texts which are considered as official rules and not only informational, but don't affect over the wire data. The border between standards track and BCP is often unclear. If a document only affects the "Internet Standards Process" aka BCP 9 or IETF administration, it's clearly a BCP. If it only defines rules and regulations for IANA registries it's less clear, most of these documents are BCPs, but some are on standards track. For other uses of IANA, see IANA (disambiguation). ...

The BCP series also covers technical recommendations for how to practice Internet standards, for instance the recommendation to use source filtering to make DoS attacks harder (RFC 2827: "Network Ingress Filtering: Defeating Denial of Service Attacks which employ IP Source Address Spoofing") is BCP 38.

See also

• Academic publishing
• Internet standard
• List of RFCs
• April 1st RFC

Academic publishing describes the subfield of publishing which distributes academic research and scholarship. ... An Internet standard is a specification for an innovative internetworking technology or methodology, which the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) ratified as an open standard after the innovation underwent peer review. ... This is a list of RFCs. ... Every April 1st since 1989, the Internet Engineering Task Force has published one or more humorous RFC documents, following in the path blazed by the June 1973 RFC titled ARPAWOCKY. List RFC 527 - ARPAWOCKY R. Merryman, UCSD; 22 June 1973; a Lewis Carroll pastiche RFC 748 - Telnet randomly-lose option. ...

External links

• RFC Editor
• RFC Frequently Asked Questions
• RFC Database
• RFC Errata
• RFC Index (text)
• RFC Index (html) With the text of each RFC, also mentions what other RFCs this one "updates" or is "updated by".
• Official RFC standardization status
• RFC keyword search

References

This article was originally based on material from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, which is licensed under the GFDL. The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (FOLDOC) is an online, searchable encyclopedic dictionary of computing subjects. ... GNU logo (similar in appearance to a gnu) The GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL or simply GFDL) is a copyleft license for free content, designed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for the GNU project. ...