> -----Original Message-----
> From: Julian Reschke [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2012 12:54 PM
> To: Murray S. Kucherawy
> Cc: [email protected]; [email protected];
> [email protected]
> Subject: Re: [websec] AppsDir review of draft-ietf-websec-strict-transport-sec
>
> Technically it *does* point to the authoritative definition.
The real issue here is that we don't have a (ahem) standard way to import ABNF
definitions from other documents. The specific problem in this case to me is
twofold:
1) Section 4 of RFC5234 specifies that the prose-val construction is a
mechanism of "last resort", which I take to mean one uses it only when the
thing you need to describe is sufficiently complicated that it's easier to
describe in English than in ABNF. I don't think "1*DIGIT" qualifies, nor does
an import from another document because we do it all the time with a non-ABNF
sentence. (Now, if that admonition in RFC5234 needs clarification, then let's
do that.)
2) There's a common axiom that says it's safer to refer to a definition rather
than to copy it. I understand that we're up against reader convenience here,
which can suffer when a copy isn't used, especially when the definitions being
recycled are scattered throughout many documents. Although I'm infinitely
confident the string "1*DIGIT" was copied correctly from RFC2616 to this draft,
I'm concerned that approval of this use will eventually lead to a case where
some author uses prose-val to copy something more complex in the name of reader
convenience, and get it wrong, and now we have two documents that don't agree
on the definition of something. That may or may not have serious side effects.
What I would prefer in this case is to say one of these:
"delta-seconds" in defined in Section 3.3.2 of RFC2616.
delta-seconds = <defined in Section 3.3.2 of RFC2616>
I strongly prefer the former. I still think the latter is an improper use of
prose-val, but at least the ABNF itself isn't copied there.
To address the larger question, we definitely have to have some conversation
about the right way to do this in general. Perhaps another draft that updates
RFC5234 which presents a consensus view of the right, safe, convenient way to
do so would be useful. Perhaps further we just say that what you're doing here
is the new official way to do so, where the ABNF inside the prose-val is a
convenience copy with the understanding that the referenced definition is
authoritative if somehow they diverged.
For example, we could standardize on a prose-val whose contents are of the form:
name = < [ABNF] "from " [ "Section " 1*DIGIT *( "." 1*DIGIT) " of " ]
"RFC" 1*DIGIT >
This would be interpreted as: "name" is defined in the specified RFC, possibly
down to the specified Section. If ABNF is there, it is a convenience copy; the
referenced document contains the official definition of "name". And people
would just discourage the convenience copy in cases where it's non-trivial.
(We'd have to bang on this a bit to allow importing from documents that aren't
RFCs, but you get the idea.)
I'd be happy to write that up as something that updates 5234 if people think
that's a good idea.
-MSK
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