[rfc-i] rfc-interest Digest, Vol 89, Issue 11

[Ole Jacobsen]

As I contemplate 25 years in the "Publishing Business" (sort of), I 
find myself wondering if we are really discussing a "presentation 
format" or something else (as well). We clearly care A LOT about what 
an RFC looks like, that is really "set in stone" in the same way I 
used to approve films, or paste-up boards, and nowadays PDF files, 
that are supposed to represent "what it will look like when printed."

Flexibility in output (presentation) formats to accommodate "a wide 
range of platforms" seems like a nice goal until you start looking at
the nitty-gritty details. When you let lines wrap, well, they wrap
and carefully lined-up stuff no longer lines up.

I don't have any bright ideas, but simply picking an existing 
"standard" (other than ASCII) is probably not the answer until we
understand all the consequences.

Ole


Ole J. Jacobsen
Editor and Publisher,  The Internet Protocol Journal
Cisco Systems
Tel: +1 408-527-8972   Mobile: +1 415-370-4628
E-mail: ole at cisco.com  URL: http://www.cisco.com/ipj
Skype: organdemo