rfc1539.txt

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Network Working Group                                          G. Malkin
Request for Comments: 1539                                Xylogics, Inc.
Obsoletes: 1391                                             October 1993
FYI: 17
Category: Informational


                            The Tao of IETF
    A Guide for New Attendees of the Internet Engineering Task Force


Status of this Memo

   This memo provides information for the Internet community.  It does
   not specify an Internet standard.  Distribution of this memo is
   unlimited.


Abstract

   Over the last two years, the attendance at Internet Engineering Task
   Force (IETF) Plenary meetings has grown phenomenally.  Approximately
   38% of the attendees are new to the IETF at each meeting.  About 33%
   of those go on to become regular attendees.  When the meetings were
   smaller, it wasn't very difficult for a newcomer to get to know
   people and get into the swing of things.  Today, however, a newcomer
   meets many more new people, some previously known only as the authors
   of Request For Comments (RFC) documents or thought provoking email
   messages.

   The purpose of this For Your Information (FYI) RFC is to explain to
   the newcomers how the IETF works.  This will give them a warm, fuzzy
   feeling and enable them to make the meeting more productive for
   everyone.  This FYI will also provide the mundane bits of information
   which everyone who attends an IETF meeting should know.


Acknowledgments

   The IETF Secretariat is made up of the following people: Steve Coya
   (Executive Director of the IETF), Cynthia Clark, Lois Keiper, Debra
   Legare, John Stewart, and Megan Davies Walnut.  These are the people
   behind the Registration Table, and the success, of the IETF meetings.
   I thank them for their hard work, and for their input and review of
   this document.  Thanks also to Vinton Cerf, Christian Huitema, and
   Jon Postel for their review and comments.  And, as always, special
   thanks to April Marine and Joyce Reynolds.




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Table of Contents

   Section 1 - The "Fun" Stuff
      What is the IETF? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  2
      Humble Beginnings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
      The Hierarchy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
      IETF Mailing Lists  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  5
      Registration  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  6
      Newcomers' Orientation  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
      Dress Code  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
      Seeing Spots Before Your Eyes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
      Terminal Room . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
      Social Event  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
      Agenda  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  9
      Other General Things  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  9

   Section 2 - The "You've got to know it" Stuff
      Registration Bullets  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
      Mailing Lists and Archives  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
      Important Email Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
      IETF Proceedings  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
      InterNIC Archives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
      Be Prepared . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
      RFCs and Internet-Drafts  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
      Frequently Asked Questions (and Their Answers)  . . . . . . . 16
      Pointers to Useful Documents and Files  . . . . . . . . . . . 17

   Section 3 - The "Reference" Stuff
      Tao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
      IETF Area Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
      Acronyms  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
      References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
      Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
      Author's Address  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22


What is the IETF?

   The Internet Engineering Task Force is a loosely self-organized group
   of people who make technical and other contributions to the
   engineering and evolution of the Internet and its technologies.  It
   is the principal body engaged in the development of new Internet
   Standard specifications.  Its mission includes:

   o  Identifying, and proposing solutions to, pressing operational and
      technical problems in the Internet;





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   o  Specifying the development or usage of protocols and the near-term
      architecture to solve such technical problems for the Internet;

   o  Making recommendations to the Internet Engineering Steering Group
      (IESG) regarding the standardization of protocols and protocol
      usage in the Internet;

   o  Facilitating technology transfer from the Internet Research Task
      Force (IRTF) to the wider Internet community; and

   o  Providing a forum for the exchange of information within the
      Internet community between vendors, users, researchers, agency
      contractors, and network managers.

   The IETF Plenary meeting is not a conference, although there are
   technical presentations.  The IETF is not a traditional standards
   organization, although many standards are produced.  The IETF is the
   volunteers who meet three times a year to fulfill the IETF mission.

   There is no membership in the IETF.  Anyone may register for and
   attend any meeting.  The closest thing there is to being an IETF
   member is being on the IETF or Working Group mailing lists (see the
   IETF Mailing Lists section).  This is where the best information
   about current IETF activities and focus can be found.


Humble Beginnings

   The first IETF meeting was held in January, 1986 at Linkabit in San
   Diego with 15 attendees.  The 4th IETF, held at SRI in Menlo Park in
   October, 1986, was the first at which non-government vendors
   attended.  The concept of Working Groups (WG) was introduced at the
   5th IETF meeting at the NASA Ames Research Center in California in
   February, 1987.  The 7th IETF, held at MITRE in McLean, Virginia in
   July, 1987, was the first meeting with over 100 attendees.

   The 14th IETF meeting was held at Stanford University in July, 1989.
   It marked a major change in the structure of the IETF universe.  The
   IAB (then Internet Activities Board, now Internet Architecture
   Board), which until that time oversaw many Task Forces, changed its
   structure to leave only two: the IETF and the IRTF.  The IRTF is
   tasked to consider the long-term research problems in the Internet.
   The IETF also changed at that time.








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   After the Internet Society (ISOC) was formed in January 1992, the IAB
   proposed to ISOC that the IAB's activities should take place under
   the auspices of the Internet Society.  During INET92, in Kobe, Japan,
   the ISOC Trustees approved a new charter for the IAB to reflect the
   proposed relationship.

   A recent first for the IETF was its first European meeting.  In July,
   1993, the IETF met in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.  The U.S./non-U.S.
   attendees split was nearly 50/50.


The Hierarchy

   To completely understand the structure of the IETF, it is useful to
   understand the overall structure in which the IETF resides.  There
   are four groups in the structure: the ISOC and its Board of Trustees
   (BOT), the IAB, the IESG, and the IETF itself.

   Internet standardization is an organized activity of the ISOC.  The
   ISOC is a professional society that is concerned with the growth and
   evolution of the worldwide Internet, with the way in which the
   Internet is and can be used, and with the social, political, and
   technical issues which arise as a result.  The BOT is responsible for
   approving appointments to the IAB from among the nominees submitted
   by the IETF nominating committee.

   The IAB is a technical advisory group of the ISOC.  It is chartered
   to provide oversight of the architecture of the Internet and its
   protocols, and to serve, in the context of the Internet Standards
   process, as a body to which the decisions of the IESG may be
   appealed.  The IAB is responsible for approving appointments to the
   IESG from among the nominees submitted by the IETF nominations
   committee.

   The IESG is responsible for technical management of IETF activities
   and the Internet Standards process.  As part of the ISOC, it
   administers the process according to the rules and procedures which
   have been ratified by the ISOC BOT.  The IESG is directly responsible
   for the actions associated with entry into and movement along the
   IETF "standards track", including final approval of specifications as
   Internet Standards.










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   The IETF is divided into nine functional Areas.  They are:
   Applications, Internet Services, Network Management, Operational
   Requirements, Routing, Security, Service Applications, Transport, and
   User Services.  Each Area has at least one Area Director.  There is
   also an Area Director who oversees Standards Management.  The Area
   Directors, along with the IETF Chair, form the IESG.  Phillip Gross
   has been the IETF Chair since the IETF's 7th meeting.  He founded the
   IESG and serves as its Chair as well.

   Each Area has several Working Groups.  A Working Group is a group of
   people who work under a charter to achieve a certain goal.  That goal
   may be the creation of an informational document, the creation of a
   protocol standard, or the resolution of problems in the Internet.
   Most Working Groups have a finite lifetime.  That is, once a Working
   Group has achieved its goal, it disbands.  As in the IETF, there is
   no official membership for a Working Group.  Unofficially, a Working
   Group member is somebody who's on that Working Group's mailing list;
   however, anyone may attend a Working Group meeting (see the Be
   Prepared section below).

   Areas may also have Birds of a Feather (BOF) groups.  They generally
   have the same goals as Working Groups, except that they have no
   charter and usually only meet once or twice.  BOFs are often held to
   determine if there is enough interest to form a Working Group.


IETF Mailing Lists

   Anyone who plans to attend an IETF meeting should join the IETF
   announcements mailing list.  This is where all of the meeting
   information, new and revised Internet-Draft and RFC announcements,
   IESG Recommendations, and Last Calls are posted.  People who'd like
   to "get technical" may also join the IETF discussion list,
   "[e-mail]".  This was the only list before the
   announcement list was created and is where discussions of cosmic
   significance are held (most Working Groups have their own mailing
   lists for discussions relating to their work).  To join the IETF
   announcement list, send a request to:

        [e-mail]

   To join the IETF discussion list, send a request to:

        [e-mail]

   To join both of the lists, simply send a single message, to either
   "-request" address, and indicate that you'd like to join both lists.




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   Do not, ever, under any circumstances, for any reason, send a request
   to join a list to the list itself!  The thousands of people on the
   list don't need, or want, to know when a new person joins.
   Similarly, when changing email addresses or leaving a list, send your
   request only to the "-request" address, not to the main list.  This
   means you!!

   The IETF discussion list is unmoderated.  This means that anyone can
   express their opinions about issues affecting the Internet.  However,
   it is not a place for companies or individuals to solicit or
   advertise.  Only the Secretariat can send a message to the
   announcement list.

   Even though the IETF mailing lists "represent" the IETF membership at
   large, it is important to note that attending an IETF meeting does
   not automatically include addition to either mailing list.


Registration

   As previously mentioned, all meeting announcements are sent to the
   IETF announcement list.  Within the IETF meeting announcement is a
   Registration Form and complete instructions for registering,