Dave, > Scott Brim wrote: > > My rule of thumb is: when you're writing the draft if something is not a > > MUST, ask yourself "why not?" and write down your answer. You can be > > brief but make it clear that the SHOULD is a MUST with exceptions. > > > This gets to an essential issue with IETF specification writing, as well as > suggesting some of the distinction between MUST and SHOULD. > > (By the way, I hope folks are clear that IETF use of these words as normative > does not depend upon the case that is used?) This is NOT true. These terms are explicitly defined in all capital letters to make it possible to distinguish when they are being used as normative and when they are not. One of the things RFC authors need to be careful about is to ensure that they do capitalize these terms consistently. In text that is not meant to be normative, the special terms should be avoided - even in lower case - but this can lead to exceptionally stilted use of the English language. -- Eric _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf