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Re: unregistered subtypes in MIME

1994-10-27 18:38:34
These two at least are done deals -- why not use them?

Apart from the reasons that have so eloquently been voiced by others, one
other reason is that it is still not easy to get an overview of what types
have been registered.

I would certainly agree that there are many issues that have not been
adequately addressed in some of the current registrations. (My personal
favorite is security, which is a total joke.) However, just because some issues
have been raised (eloquently or otherwise) doesn't mean the present
registrations are invalid and should not be used. They are there, they are
valid, and like it or not they are being widely used already. The alternative
of using some unregistered something-or-other is much worse, in my opinion.

However, I have to disagree entirely with the assessment that its especially
difficult to find out most of the types have been registered. Starting with the
RFC index (pretty basic), I immediately find that RFC1590 has updated RFC1521
in this regard. Fetching RFC1590, I find the following:

   The Media Type registrations will be posted in the anonymous FTP
   directory "ftp.isi.edu:in-notes/media-types" and the Media Type will
   be listed in the periodically issued "Assigned Numbers" RFC [2].  The
   Media Type description may be published as an Informational RFC by
   sending it to "rfc-editor(_at_)isi(_dot_)edu" (please follow the 
instructions to
   RFC authors [3]).

The types you referred to are in fact listed in this registry.

This seems quite clear to me. Now, if you want to argue that finding the RFC
archives and the RFC index is difficult, well, that's fine, but I don't think
such a problem would apply only to MIME type registration. Similarly, I would
much prefer to see timely publication of an assigned numbers RFC (which hasn't
happened since RFC1340 as far as I know), but the fact that this information is
available and adequate pointers to it do exist.

                                Ned

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