IETF STEERING GROUP (IESG) REPORT FROM THE TELECONFERENCE FEBRUARY 6th, 1992 Reported by: Greg Vaudreuil, IESG Secretary This report contains - Meeting Agenda - Meeting Attendees - Meeting Notes Please contact IESG Secretary Greg Vaudreuil ATTENDEES --------- Almquist, Philip / Consultant Borman, David / Cray Research Chiappa, Noel Crocker, Dave / TBO Crocker, Steve / TIS Coya, Steve / CNRI Davin, Chuck / MIT Gross, Philip / ANS Hinden, Robert / BBN Hobby, Russ / UC-DAVIS Reynolds, Joyce / ISI Stockman, Bernard / SUNET/NORDUnet Vaudreuil, Greg / CNRI Regrets Estrada, Susan / CERFnet Huizer, Erik / SURFnet Piscitello, Dave/ Bellcore AGENDA ------ 1.0 Administrivia 1.1 Bash the Agenda 1.2 Approval of the Minutes 1.1.1 91-12-05 1.1.2 91-12-12 1.1.3 92-01-02 1.1.4 92-01-23 1.3 Next Meeting 2.0 Review of Action Items 3.0 Protocol Actions 3.1 IP Type of Service 3.2 SMDS to Draft Standard 3.3 RFC 822 Message Extensions 3.4 Network Fax 3.5 Character MIBS 3.6 Point to Point Protocol (Noel Chiappa) 3.7 Building a Network Information Services Infrastructure 3.8 SNMP Security documents 3.9 X.400 Documents 3.10 Using the OSI Directory to Achieve User Friendly Naming 3.11 TCP Extensions for High Speed High Delay Paths 3.12 IP over FDDI to Draft 4.0 Technical Management Issues 4.1 Interoperability testing at IETF meetings. 4.2 IAB Standards Process Document 4.3 RFC 931 User Authentication Protocol 4.4 IANA and the Class "B" allocation strategy 4.5 Internet Draft Format Requirements "Deplorable Documents" 4.6 Email Host Requirements 4.7 Working Group Early Warning System 5.0 IESG Technical Evolution document. 6.0 Working Group Actions 6.1 Audio/Video Teleconferencing (avt) 6.2 Token Ring Monitoring MIB (trmon) MINUTES ------- 1.0 Adminstrivia 1.1 Bash the Agenda Several items were added to the agenda. Review of the action items, approval of the minutes, and technical management issues were deferred until the next meeting. 1.2 Review of the Minutes The review of outstanding minutes was deferred until the next meeting. 1.3 Next Meeting The IESG agreed to meet again by teleconference February 20th. Due to the large backlog of work the February 20th meeting was extended to 3 hours, ending at 3 PM EST rather than the normal 2PM EST. A special purpose teleconference will be called with Erik Huizer, Dave Piscitello, Phill Gross, and any other available person to discuss the outstanding OSI X.400 and X.500 documents on February 13th. ACTION: Coya, Vaudreuil -- If Huizer and Piscitello can make the date, schedule a 1 hour teleconference January 13th from 12PM to 1PM EST. 2) Review of the Action Items Review of the action items was deferred until the next IESG teleconference. 3) Protocol Actions 3.1 IP Type of Service 3.1.1 The IESG has received several comments on the TOS document, and all comments were successfully resolved. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- After approval from the Internet Area Directors, craft and send a recommendation to the IAB to publish the TOS document as a Proposed Standard. 3.1.2 The IESG discussed the IP Forwarding Table MIB. The MIB has been delayed by the IESG due to a dependency upon the TOS document. Now that the TOS document is ready for publication, the IESG approved the MIB. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Craft and send a recommendation to the IAB recommending the "IP Forwarding Table MIB" be published as a Proposed Standard RFC. Include in the recommendation a note indicating the dependency on the TOS document. 3.2 SMDS to Draft Standard 3.2.1 The IESG continues to wait for information on the operational experience with the IP over SMDS protocol. The IESG has the report on interoperable implementations demonstrated at Interop, but seeks information on continuing operational use among real users. ACTION: Vaudreuil --- Send a message to George Clapp reminding him that the IESG needs information on the extent of operational deployment before it can move IP over SMDS to Draft Standard. 3.2.2 The SMDS Interface MIB is ready for publication. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Craft and send a recommendation to the IAB to elevate the "Definitions of Managed Objects for the SIP Interface Type" as a Proposed Standard RFC. 3.3 RFC 822 Message Format Extensions. 3.3.1 The IESG discussed the message format extensions (MIME). Several comments were received in response to the IESG's Last Call. In particular, comments were made objecting to the technical decisions made in the working group, and the process by which these decisions were made. The specific technical and proceedural issues raised were discussed by the IESG, and the IESG is satisfied that adequate group discussions occured with reasonable consideration of the proferred design choices. The IESG discussed the general process for dealing with such complaints. In general, the IESG reviews each comment made in response to the Last Call. The IESG felt that each such comment deserves consideration and an official response from the IESG. In the specific case of objections which are raised about a technical design choice, the working group must be able to document that the suggested alternative was considered, and after reasonable debate was rejected. POSITION: In the case where a participant of a working group objects to a technical decision made by the working group to reject a particular proposal, the working group must be able do document either in the mail archives or in the minutes of face to face meetings that the alternatives were considered and rejected. POSITION: Any person who raises a technical or procedural objection in response to a Last Call from the IESG should receive a formal reply from the IESG noting their comments and (responding to their objections) ACTION: Hobby -- Respond to the several persons who have made comments in response to the IESG Last Call. Several deficiencies in the specification were noted in the specification. Among the shortcoming was 1) a lack of rigor in the citation of external specifications and 2) an ambiguity about the semantics of the external reference content-type. The Internet Draft "MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions):" will require improved citations of external specifications and a more precise specification of the External-Reference sub-type, prior to publication as a Proposed Standard. ACTION: Russ Hobby -- Notify the 822 Message Format Extensions working group that the Internet Draft "MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)" needs to have editorial changes before it can be recommended for Proposed Standard. Send the notification to the Working Group mailing list and the Working Group chairman. 3.3.1 The IESG discussed the multi-lingual extensions for RFC 822 messages headers. Several concerns were raised in the IESG. One of the message header encoding mechanisms is slightly different that the analogous encoding in MIME. Second, there was concern among some IESG members that changing the header parsing engines to deal with the backward compatible changes may be too costly to do independent of consideration of other header changes being considered in other forums. Due to the full agenda and a desire to complete as many protocol actions as possible, the IESG deferred further discussion until the February 20th teleconference. ACTION: Vaudreuil: Reschedule the RFC-Headers discussion for the February 20th Teleconference. 3.4 Network Fax Protocol. The Network Fax working group submitted the Internet Draft "A File Format for the Exchange of Images in the Internet" for Proposed Standard. The IESG discussed this document, and agreed that the format chosen, a subset of TIFF, was a reasonable format for the sending of fax-like images. The wording of the current document is unclear about the scope of intended usage of this format. The IESG is not entirely comfortable with the choice of TIFF a common general purpose image format for the Internet because it could not handle color or grayscale images. The IESG felt unable to take a position on whether TIFF as a whole or a larger TIFF subset would be acceptable as a common general purpose image format. ACTION: Hobby -- Communicate to the NETFAX working group the concerns of the IESG on the Internet Draft "A File Format for the Exchange of Images in the Internet". Seek clarification of the intended scope of the Network Fax specification. 3.5 Character MIBs Three MIBS were submitted to the IESG for consideration as Proposed Standards. The IESG reviewed each, and approved them for Proposed Standard status. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Send a recommendation to the IAB that the Internet Drafts "Definitions of Managed Objects for Character Stream Devices", "Definitions of Managed Objects for Parallel-printer-like Hardware Devices", and "Definitions of Managed Objects for RS-232-like Hardware Devices" be published as Proposed Standard RFC's. The IESG noted the miscommunication between the IESG and the Working Group which caused nearly a years delay in the publication of these documents. These character MIB's have been widely implemented and tested to the point where they almost meet the requirements for Draft Standards. The IESG reaffirmed it's view that multiple interoperable implementations are not required for Proposed Standard. 3.8 Point-to-Point Protocols to Draft Standard The base Point-to-Point documents were submitted to the IESG for consideration as Proposed Standards. These documents are dramatic reworks of the original documents, with extensive editorial changes. The actual technical changes are relatively minor, and are nominally backward compatible. The Working Group originally asked the IESG for Draft Standard status given the lengthy time and numbers of implementations. The IESG discussed the current implemenations, and while there are multiple interoperable implementations of PPP, they do not reflect the current documents and do not demonstrate the new features of the current documents. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Write a recommendation to the IAB to publish the Internet Drafts "The PPP Internet Protocol Control Protocol (IPCP)" and the "The Point-to-Point Protocol for the Transmission of Multi-Protocol Datagrams Over Point-to-Point Links" as Proposed Standards. Send the recommendation as soon as final versions of the documents have been received. 3.9 Building a Network Information Services Infrastructure The Internet Draft "Building a Network Information Services Infrastructure" was reviewed by the User Services area director and recommended by the IESG for publication as an FYI RFC. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Craft and send a notification to the RFC Editor that the Internet Draft "Building a Network Information Services Infrastructure" should be published as an FYI RFC. 3.10 SNMP Security The IESG has received a request from the SNMP Security Working Group to recommend the Internet Drafts "SNMP Administrative Model", "Definitions of Managed Objects for Administration of SNMP Parties", and "SNMP Security Protocols" for Proposed Standard. A Last Call was issued, but no action was taken by the IESG pending the two week comment period. The IESG was alerted to the potential issues in this protocol of export control. The SNMP Security documents specify the use of technology which may not be freely shared among IETF participating countries. While the IESG understood the problem, it was not willing to stop the publication of such protocols when clear need is demonstrated. The IESG did discuss adding a section to such protocol documents flagging the protocols as using potentially export controlled technology. ACTION: Gross, Crocker -- Inquire with the IAB on behalf of the IESG about the desirability of flagging software export control issues in RFCs. 3.11 X.400 documents The IAB has asked for discussion with the IESG on two X.400 related RFCs, "X.400 1988 to 1984 downgrading" and "Mapping between X.400(1988) / ISO 10021 and RFC 822". The IAB wanted information on the degree of IETF Working Group involvement and RARE consultation. Because neither of the OSI Integration Area Directors where present, discussion was deferred until a special topics teleconference February 13th. 3.12 User Friendly naming Progress is being made in resolving the outstanding issues in the X.500 User Friendly Naming proposals. The document has been split into two, one specifying User Friendly naming format, and the other specifying the "fuzzy" matching algorithm for searching the directory. These documents have been posted as Internet Drafts. No action is required by the IESG at this time. No official notification from the IESG was made to the OSI Directory Services Working Group remanding the documents back for re-work, however, Steve Hardcastle-Kille has made such an announcement to the working group and has solicited review of the proposed changes. Action: Vaudreuil -- Send a message the IAB notifying them that new Internet Drafts have been posted. 3.13 TCP Extensions The SACK option has proven to be controversial. The TCP Extensions document is currently being split into two, and has been withdrawn from IESG consideration until these changes are made. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Drop the TCP-Extensions document from the Active queue of the IESG. 3.14 IP over FDDI. A request was received from the dormant IP over FDDI working group to elevate RFC 1103 "Proposed standard for the transmission of IP datagrams over FDDI Networks" to Draft Standard. The IESG briefly discussed a set of minor changes that would be helpful to make before being elevated to Draft Standard. ACTION: Chiappa -- Task the IP over FDDI working group to edit a new version of IP over FDDI reflecting current usage of the protocol. 4) Technical Management Issues Discussion of the many technical management issues facing the IESG was deferred until the February 20th Teleconference. 5) IESG Technical Evolution Document Discussion of IESG Technical Evolution Document was deferred until a future Teleconference. 6. Working Group Actions 1) Audio/ Video Transport The IESG continued discussion of the proposed Audio/Video Transport Working Group. No new charter has been received in response to the IESG concerns. In the absence of the new charter, the IESG was unable to approve this Working Group. ACTION: Vaudreuil -- Send a note to Steve Casner reminding him that the IESG cannot approve his proposed working group until an acceptable charter has been filed with the IESG. 2) Token Ring Monitoring Working Group A charter was presented to the IESG for a working group to apply the Remote Lan Monitoring work to the Token Ring LAN technology. Without objection the IESG approved this working group. ACTION Vaudreuil -- Announce the Token Ring Monitoring Working Group to the IETF mailing list.