Defining a standard

Question

How would you go about defining a standard? I am defining a protocol for a sort of thing that does not exist yet and I would like to create an RFC for it, and use a well-known port number provided by IANA. How do I start?

score 11 · Accepted Answer · edited Jul 23 '13 at 14:10

11

Check out the RFC Publication Process, which starts out life as an Internet-Draft

The RFC publication process includes the stages described below.

RFC Submission Process

RFC Editing Process

Authors' Final Review

Publication

Copyright Notice and Legend

All RFCs are first published as Internet-Drafts (I-Ds). All RFCs have been I-Ds, but not all I-Ds become RFCs...

edited Jul 23 '13 at 14:10

gnat

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answered Jul 21 '11 at 16:12

Tom Morgan

1,689

score 8 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 21 '11 at 16:12

Step 1. Write it.

Step 2. Implement it.

Step 3. Prove that it works really, really well.

Step 4. Contact ITEF and IANA. They have web sites. http://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/ for example, lists the working groups. Find the right one. Talk to them.

score 1 · Answer 3 · edited Apr 12 '17 at 07:31

1

If all you need is the port number you can contact the IANA using the form provided on http://www.iana.org/form/ports-services to request a port being assigned to you.

You probably should do that early to prevent having to change the port later on.

For actually writing an RFC see Tom Morgan's answer.

edited Apr 12 '17 at 07:31

Community

1

answered Jul 23 '13 at 16:00

johannes

3,611

Defining a standard

3 Answers3