Re: RFC 1305

[Stephen Casner <casner@acm.org>]

On Mon, 6 Jan 2003, Thomas Narten wrote:

> > Why hasn't RFC 1305 (Network Time Protocol spec) advanced from Draft
> > Standard to Full Standard and assumed its reserved STD 12 slot?
>
> Is this document actually old and (in practice) obsoleted by RFC 1769,
> which is informational rather than on standards track due to the
> author arguing that ascii is insufficient to explain all the relevant
> parts? Hence, things are sort of stuck?

RFC 1769 (Simple NTP) does not replace RFC 1305 (NTP) because it is a
simplification.  However, Scott Bradner did already reply to me
without cc'ing the lists that the reason 1305 is stuck is indeed
because Dave Mills refuses to make an ASCII version that can stand as
the official one.  So, my question has been answered, thanks.

I suggested to Scott that perhaps what we need is for a creative
volunteer to attempt to render 1305 in ASCII and then see if Dave can
be convinced to accept it.  I suspect that more than 50% of his
objection is not wanting to spend the effort rather than an assertion
that an adequate result is impossible.  The diagrams in 1305 are all
feasible for ASCII rendering, but there is some significant math with
plenty of Greek.  It's not impossible, though.

Assuming that step could be completed successfully, the result can't
become rfc1305.txt because there already is one (though crude and
incomplete).  I guess instead the result would need to be issued as a
new RFC that is classified as "updating" 1305.  It could contain an
introductory paragraph referring the reader to rfc1305.ps for a
prettier version.

                                                        -- Steve