John,
I continue to wonder whether what we should be doing here is not
to invent a new normative document format, but to figure out how
attach image-type figures to ASCII RFCs. "plates glued in the
back" is almost exactly the same as the analogy I have been
thinking about.
This is a new output format, and previous suggestions for new
input/output formats have not reached any agreement whatever -- there is
every possible opinion expressed on what format to use or not to use,
and why. IMO a big drawback of this approach is that figures (and
equations) don't appear with the text, which is not easy to use. Also,
your suggestion for a "figure supplement" to RFCs (with multiple figures
in a single PDF? file) has the same drawback.
The advantage of using PDF is that we already use it, for both drafts
and RFCs, and have a lot of experience using it. For most people it
seems to work just fine. IMO PDF is our best shot in IETF at solving
the graphics and equations issues raised in the draft.
So, while I don't think this particular experiment, as
described, is plausible, there are two ideas I'd like to see
proposed, perhaps experimentally, for the future:
(1) A PDF approach, but with PDF carefully researched and
profiled (to include searchability and copy-and-paste extraction
in addition to stability and very wide availability for readers
and formatters) and a back-out plan should the community not be
happy about the experimental results.
Specifying profiles for PDF is fine, as long as there is agreement that
it's necessary.
When I said "should not have been last-called" in a prior
note, I wasn't trying to suggest that the _idea_ was obviously
dead or bad. I was trying to suggest, instead, that, when an
idea is discussed at length on the IETF list and a number of
issues raised with it, it is normal for the IESG to insist that
any version of the idea that is subsequently to be last-called
address most of those issues in some substantive way. "We
don't see X as a problem" may be appropriate; pretending
(deliberately or by accidental omission) that X was not raised
or discussed as an issue is usually not. The fraction of the
Last Call discussion that essentially duplicates the discussions
of some months ago is probably testimony to the wisdom of that
principle.
I think you're referring to the comment (from a couple of people) that
the authors "ignored" a "consensus" to specify PDF profiles in the
proposed experiment. However, we did not "ignore" anything. It was not
clear to me (or the other co-authors) prior to the -02 version that
there was any "consensus" RE specifying PDF profiles/formats/versions, a
couple of people as I recall commented on that perhaps, among dozens of
other suggestions. Which suggestions are we supposed to treat as
consensus?
It isn't up to any one individual to declare one comment or another
comment as "consensus" and then charge the authors with ignoring the
supposed "consensus" after the fact. If the authors agree to address a
particular comment, OK, but we didn't get that far in the discussion of
the -01 draft leading up to the -02 draft. Also, no additional comments
were made during the 3-week comment period on the -02 draft before last
call was initiated; there was time to raise the comment again.
In any case, it is OK to specify profiles/versions/features in the next
revision if there is agreement. It is a last call comment that can be
incorporated in the -03 version.
Jerry
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