In <3E25A6E4(_dot_)1010600(_at_)Sonietta(_dot_)blilly(_dot_)com> Bruce Lilly
<blilly(_at_)erols(_dot_)com> writes:
Charles Lindsey wrote:
The primary impact will be on the installed base within Usenet. That is an
issue for the Usefor WG to consider, and it has concluded that the impact
is manageable.
That installed base includes gateways and moderators. While some in the
Usefor WG may think that the impact of the proposed changes are
manageable, there are a significant number of others who strongly
disagree. And the IESG and IETF will have to be convinced that the
installed base will not be presented with data which is illegal under the
existing standard -- that is what "the impact of a new standard on the
installed base that uses the old standard" means.
Whenever a new feature is added to a protocol, it is likely that the
installed base will not be able to accept the new "illegal" constructions.
If the IETF does not occasionally allow such things to occur, no new
features will ever get added to anything.
So the correct thing is to examine what harm, if any, will arise, and to
decide whether it is tolerable. At the least, all things that currently
work should continue to work.
But, in fact, the IESG and the IETF do, occasionally, allow a change in a
protocol that does not even allow current practice to continue. Let me
give you an example:
The OpenPGP standard made a non-compatible change to the protocol for
signing documents (non-compatible with the de facto situation obtaining
previously with PGP 2.6.x and PGP 5.x). You can indeed make signatures
with PGP 2.6.x that will not verify under OpenPGP (PGP 6.x and later) and
vice versa. The standard for application/pgp-signature had to be changed,
and a new RFC issued.
But did I hear you railing against this? No!
In fact, the change in OpenPGP was a very necessary one, since the
behaviour of the old PGP 2.6.x was stupid and inconsistent - in fact, it
was a BUG. Better to fix it and accept the pain, than to perpetuate it for
ever.
--
Charles H. Lindsey ---------At Home, doing my own thing------------------------
Tel: +44 161 436 6131 Fax: +44 161 436 6133 Web: http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~chl
Email: chl(_at_)clw(_dot_)cs(_dot_)man(_dot_)ac(_dot_)uk Snail: 5
Clerewood Ave, CHEADLE, SK8 3JU, U.K.
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