[tap-l] Test Anything Protocol as an IETF draft/RFC

[Lisa Dusseault]

Hi Salve,

Since you mention the IETF Standards Track specifically, I guess  
you're looking for a Proposed Standard RFC that has been published  
through the IETF consensus process, which typically involves a Working  
Group (WG).

Off the standards track is the other option, which doesn't involve  
consensus-building or a WG.  This might mean publishing the protocol  
specification through the RFC Editor's individual submission stream.   
This gets you an RFC which is marked as "Informational" status and  
with a disclaimer saying it's not a product of IETF Consensus.  You  
can, however, document not just the technical details but also some  
notes on implementation and deployment, to show people that it's  
really in use.  An informational RFC is a moderately useful stamp of  
approval and is great for getting a stake in the ground.

If you're looking to build a WG and build community awareness and  
participation, I think TAP would be an excellent topic and I will  
definitely help.  The rough steps for forming a WG:
  - Create a mailing list under IETF contribution rules (https://datatracker.ietf.org/list/request/ 
)
  - Advertise the mailing list and the effort, and get participation  
-- one might get people talking early about the proposals by  
publishing them as Internet-Drafts and asking for input on the new list
  - Prepare a draft charter for a WG and discuss it on the new list
  - Ask me for a BOF slot about 2 months in advance of the IETF  
meeting you want to have the BOF at.

It's also sometimes possible to publish individual submissions,  
without a WG, on the Standards Track.  This is less certain and it  
doesn't have the side effect of building a wider community around the  
new standard (the standards community helps maintain, revise or extend  
the standard, but also participation in the WG usually encourages  
wider implementation, deployment and interoperability).   The lack of  
certainty is in part because different ADs have different personal  
requirements before they agree to sponsor an individual submission on  
the Standards Track.  One of my requirements, for example, is to see  
demonstrated interoperability even before Proposed Standard, as well  
as showing wide appeal.

Lisa

On Jun 12, 2008, at 6:04 AM, Salve J Nilsen wrote:

> Hi, Chris & Lisa
>
> I had a talk with Harald T. Alvestrand <harald at alvestrand.no> a  
> while back, and he recommended me to contact you guys/the IETF Apps  
> area about finding a way to get TAP (Test Anything Protocol) through  
> the IETF standards track.
>
> Quickly, about TAP: It's basically a unidirectional, single-channel,  
> transport-independent protocol for communicating test successes/ 
> failures and metadata between any TAP producer and a consumer which  
> aggregates and reports the results.
>
> http://testanything.org/
> http://testanything.org/wiki/index.php/TAP_Producers
> http://testanything.org/wiki/index.php/TAP_Consumers
>
> Earlier versions of TAP has grown and been used in the Perl/CPAN  
> community for many years now, and currently there is a consensus in  
> the Perl QA crowd that TAP probably would be useful for other  
> communities too. Therefore this mail.
>
> Can you guys give us a few pointers on how to proceed on getting an  
> IETF stamp of approval? :)
>
> Feel free to ask any technical and/or philosophical questions  
> related to TAP, I'm sure the guys on <tap-l at testanything.org> (CC'd)  
> can help you with those. ;-)
>
>
> Kind regards,
>
> - Salve J. Nilsen <salvejn at met.no> (informally on behalf of tap-l)