On May 15, 2007, at 12:22 PM, ned+ietf-smtp(_at_)mrochek(_dot_)com wrote:
I went so far to recommend more or less this approach for the ABNF
specification and even went so far as to generate a list of
references and uses
of each of ABNF's "features". This was in effect rejected by the
IESG, however,
in favor of documenting the existance of at least two ABNF validators.
That wasn't so much rejected as it just happened that I felt like
fooling around with ABNF validators. I learned a lot while doing it
and once done, writing the interop report went quickly. I admit this
was probably not my highest priority thing to do at the time but it
was fun.
I thought this was a poor decision at the time and still do. IMO
what matters
about ABNF - and by extension any other document that provides
definitional
tools for other specifications - is whether or not it is actually
used by
mulitplle specifications to achieve bettter specification clarity
and therefore
increase the chance of creating interoperable implementations.
Whether or not
there happens to be a way to backstop the use of such a document
with a
validation tool strikes me as largely irrelevant.
Not really sure why you think it was a poor decision. I also told
other ADs my strong opinion that the real reason to move ABNF to
Internet Standard was that we use it all the time and it works for us
so "duh".
Lisa