[ih] IETF relevance (was Memories of Flag Day?)

[Miles Fidelman]

Traditionally, protocols have never "originated" with the IETF - they 
become standardized, and maybe standards through the RFC process, under 
the IETF aegis.  Right back to the original DoD Protocol Suite (did the 
IETF even exist when the DDN Protocol Handbook was first printed?).

Miles

Brian E Carpenter via Internet-history wrote:
> On 29-Aug-23 05:52, Miles Fidelman via Internet-history wrote:
>> Dave Crocker via Internet-history wrote:
>>> On 8/24/2023 4:07 PM, John Klensin via Internet-history wrote:
>>>> Probably a larger fraction of applications work has come to the
>>>> IETF already half-developed and in search of refinement and
>>>> validation by
>>>> the community
>>>
>>> I'm sure there are examples, but I can't think of an application
>>> protocol that was originated in the IETF over, say, the last 25 years,
>>> that has seen widespread success.
>>>
>>> d/
>>>
>> Seems to me that HTTP remains under the IETF umbrella. 
>
> But it did *not* originate in the IETF. It actually originated about
> 20 metres horizontally and 3 metres vertically from my office at CERN,
> more than a year before TimBL presented it at IETF 23 (I was wrong a few
> days ago to assert that IETF 26 was Tim's first attendance). The WWW BOF
> at IETF 26 was more than 2 years after HTTP was first deployed, to my
> personal knowledge.
>
>> Is it not the
>> RFC process, and IANA, that actually matter, in the scheme of things?
>
> In the case of HTTP, it was running code that long preceded both rough
> consensus and an RFC. I think this is completely normal and still the
> best method. Second best is code developed in parallel with the spec.
> Third best is OSI.
>
>     Brian
>


-- 
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In practice, there is.  .... Yogi Berra

Theory is when you know everything but nothing works.
Practice is when everything works but no one knows why.
In our lab, theory and practice are combined:
nothing works and no one knows why.  ... unknown