Re: Last Call: <draft-ietf-appsawg-xdash-03.txt> (Deprecating Use of the "X-" Prefix in Application Protocols) to Best Current Practice

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At 3:30 PM -0700 3/6/12, Peter Saint-Andre wrote:

 In my working copy I've changed that paragraph to:

    Implementations of application protocols MUST NOT programatically
    discriminate between "standard" and "non-standard" parameters based
    solely on the names of such parameters (i.e., based solely on
    whether the name begins with 'x-' or a similar string of characters).

I like this wording, especially because it more clearly gets at the heart of the document, which is to not discriminate based only on the name prefix.

One question, though: should this be "SHOULD NOT" rather than "MUST NOT"? The interoperability doesn't depend on implementations refraining from doing so, rather, we consider it more problematic to do so than not, so we are making a strong recommendation to not to so. Hence, "SHOULD NOT".

From RFC 2119:
   Imperatives of the type defined in this memo must be used with care
   and sparingly.  In particular, they MUST only be used where it is
   actually required for interoperation or to limit behavior which has
   potential for causing harm (e.g., limiting retransmisssions)  For
   example, they must not be used to try to impose a particular method
   on implementors where the method is not required for
   interoperability.


--
Randall Gellens
Opinions are personal;    facts are suspect;    I speak for myself only
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Language is a virus from outer space.  --William S. Burroughs
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