To:
ietf-provreg@cafax.se
From:
Edward Lewis <edlewis@arin.net>
Date:
Thu, 19 Dec 2002 08:16:01 -0800
In-Reply-To:
<3CD14E451751BD42BA48AAA50B07BAD6033703B4@vsvapostal3.prod.netsol.com>
Sender:
owner-ietf-provreg@cafax.se
Subject:
RE: EPP Compliance (Was Re: lastVerified: optional vs. extension)
Answering at my usual rate of a week late... The IETF does not get into conformance, it gets into interoperability. What this means is that we don't determine if any implementation is conformant to a specification. We are focused on whether implementations can work together. For EPP, the question will be: Can BrandX client communicate with BrandY server? Can BrandY client communicate with BrandX server? For as many values of X and Y (X != Y) as possible. In reality, the desire is that if RegistrarA uses BrandX client software, will they be able to communicate with RegistryB's BrandY server and RegistryC's BrandZ server, using the extensions needed for each environment. Each environment means the policy of the registry. From the other side, can RegistryB's BrandY server communicate with both RegistrarA's BrandX client and RegistrarD's BrandW client according to the policies set forth by the registry (modulo any tweaks for business needs)? As has been mentioned, BrandY's server will at best be described as implementing RFC's at one level of granularity. However, I should caution folks to realize that RFC's are not standards - they are documents in a series. (This misunderstanding is something that concerns me as an IETF'er, but as a WG chair, I can not to anything about it.) What we want to see is BrandY's server also claim conformance with the Draft Standard (or Full Standard) version of EPP "as defined in documents RFC <etc.>." How this works in practice is that the implementations should be extensible (just like the protocol) so that parts can be plugged in as needed. E.g., if a BrandX client is working fine with a BrandY server for the environment in which they exist but I want to start working with BrandZ server in another environment, I may need to upgrade my BrandX client. The hope is that the upgrade is possible and accomplishes the needed interaction. As part of IETF activity, we don't want to get into conformance claims and we don't want to get into conformance enforcement. -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Edward Lewis +1-703-227-9854 ARIN Research Engineer