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How does one submit a draft for consideration as an independent submission RFC?

To be considered for publishing as an RFC, a document must first be posted online as an Internet-Draft. (The exception is a document that is submitted for consideration as an April 1st RFC. See I-D Author Resources for guidance on posting an Internet-Draft.

After posting the document as an Internet-Draft, the author should send an email message to the ISE: rfc-ise@rfc-editor.org. This message should include the following information:

  • The file name of the published Internet-Draft that is being submitted.
  • The desired category (Informational or Experimental).
  • A summary of related discussion of this document, if any, that has occurred in an IETF working group or in the IESG.
  • An assertion that no IANA allocation in the document requires IETF Review or Standards Action. See RFC 8126 for a definition of these terms and RFC 8726 for more information about how IANA requests are handled for Independent Submission Stream documents.
  • A statement describing the purpose, intended audience, merits, and significance of the document.
  • An acknowledgment that the IPR rules of RFCs 4846 and 5744 apply, and that unless the authors state otherwise, permission is granted to produce derivative works, in whole or in part, as stated in those RFCs. Suggestions for one or more competent and independent potential reviewers for the document, including contact information. This can speed the review and approval process.

The ISE uses the IETF Datatracker through all stages of Independent Submission Stream document handling. The Datatracker page for a given draft shows its ISE state. RFC 6322 provides descriptions of these states. In addition, a complete list showing the ISE state for all documents in the Independent Submission Stream is available in the Datatracker.