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 _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf