Re: making a display hint RECOMMENDED in non-enum TCs

["C. M. Heard" <heard@pobox.com>]

On Tue, 22 Jul 2003, Juergen Schoenwaelder wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 22, 2003 at 12:07:08AM -0700, C. M. Heard wrote:
> > Unless there is strong support for putting this in (and a 
> > concrete suggestion both for the text and where to put it), I
> > intend to leave this out.  I think we have enough rules to
> > enforce as it is.
> 
> In that case, we should probably say somewhere that the common
> interpretation of an absent DISPLAY-HINT is "d" format.

In that case the first thing to figure out is where to put this.  
My sense is that it would best fit in a sub-section of its own;  
I'd suggest inserting it between 4.6.2 and 4.6.3.  The TOC
(abbreviated here for clarity) would change thus:

OLD:
      4.6 Textual Conventions and Object Definitions
      4.6.1 Usage of Data Types
      4.6.2 DESCRIPTION and REFERENCE Clauses
      4.6.3 Conceptual Table Definitions
      4.6.4 OID Values Assigned to Objects
      4.6.5 OID Length Limitations and Table Indexing
NEW:
      4.6 Textual Conventions and Object Definitions
      4.6.1 Usage of Data Types
      4.6.2 DESCRIPTION and REFERENCE Clauses
      4.6.3 DISPLAY-HINT Clause
      4.6.4 Conceptual Table Definitions
      4.6.5 OID Values Assigned to Objects
      4.6.6 OID Length Limitations and Table Indexing

The new section might then look something like this:

4.6.3 DISPLAY-HINT Clause

   The DISPLAY-HINT clause is used in a TC to provide a non-binding hint
   to a management application as to how the value of an instance of an
   object defined with the syntax in the TC might be displayed.  Its
   presence is optional.

   Although management applications typically default to decimal format
   ("d") for integer TCs and to ?????? format ("??") for octet string
   TCs when the DISPLAY-HINT clause is absent, it should be noted that
   SMIv2 does not actually specify any defaults.  MIB authors should be
   aware that a clear hint is provided to applications only when the
   DISPLAY-HINT clause is present.

Juergen, if the general idea is satisfactory, would you please help
fill in the questions marks and wordsmith as necessary, and if it is
not satisfactory, would you please make a counter-proposal?

Other folks: is it desirable/OK/undesirable to have this in the
document?

Thanks,

Mike