Internet DRAFT - draft-eastlake-test-rfc-numbers
draft-eastlake-test-rfc-numbers
Network Working Group D. Eastlake
Internet-Draft Futurewei Technologies
Intended status: Best Current Practice 21 August 2023
Expires: 22 February 2024
RFC Numbers for Example and Testing Use
draft-eastlake-test-rfc-numbers-02
Abstract
This document specifies several RFC numbers of various lengths for
which RFCs have never been and will never be issued. These RFC
numbers may be useful in use as examples in documentation and
referencing systems or in testing.
Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
This Internet-Draft will expire on 22 February 2024.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2023 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/
license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document.
Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components
extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as
described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are
provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.
Eastlake Expires 22 February 2024 [Page 1]
Internet-Draft Example RFC Numbers August 2023
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. The Reserved RFC Numbers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. RFC Editor Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
6. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1. Introduction
The RFC Series (ISSN 2070-1721, [RFCeditor]) contains technical and
organizational documents about the Internet, including the
specifications and policy documents produced by several streams,
currently the following five: the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF), the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF), the Internet
Architecture Board (IAB), Independent Submissions, and Editorial. It
was begun before the IETF was formed. Each RFC is assigned a unique
number and these number are not reused. (An RFC is replaced by
issuing a new RFC with a new number that obsoletes the RFC being
replaced.)
RFC numbers are widely used in IETF documentation and are frequently
referred to or displayed. Current systems are adapted for RFC
numbers up to four digits ("9999") but RFC numbers will soon overflow
to 5 digits. A five-digit example number is required that can be
used as an example in documentationa dn for testing such systems if
needed.
Example / test RFC numbers of shorter lengths may also be useful and,
conveniently enough, there exist 2-, 3-, and 4- digit RFC numbers
that have never been issued and, under current policies, never will
be issued. A system tested only with the currently common 4-digit
RFC numbers might have difficulty with shorter as well as long RFC
numbers. For example, in any such system, there are questions of
whether to pad with leading zeros to some fixed length or the like.
These considerations have some overlap with those noted in [RFC2606]
and [RFC5737], which point out that the use of designated code values
reserved for documentation and examples reduces the likelihood of
conflicts and confusion arising from such code points conflicting
with code points assigned for some actual use.
Eastlake Expires 22 February 2024 [Page 2]
Internet-Draft Example RFC Numbers August 2023
2. The Reserved RFC Numbers
The reserved RFC numbers that are available for use as examples and
in testing and experimentation with systems that process or use RFC
numbers are show below. These numbers were chosen as the smallest
unused number of each length that had not been used yet and which, to
minimize the likelihood of errors, did not include any zeros or
multiple occurrences of the same digit.
+========+================+
| Length | RFC Number |
+========+================+
| 1 | none available |
+--------+----------------+
| 2 | 14 |
+--------+----------------+
| 3 | 159 |
+--------+----------------+
| 4 | 1839 |
+--------+----------------+
| 5 | 12345 |
+--------+----------------+
Table 1
3. RFC Editor Considerations
The RFC Editor is requested to reserve the RFC numbers listed in
Section 2 so that RFCs with those numbers are never issued.
4. IANA Considerations
In order to improve the findability/visibility of these reserved RFC
numbers, IANA is requested to create a registry as follows with
contents from Table 1:
Name: Reserved RFC Numbers
Assignment Method: RFC Editor approval.
Reference: [this document]
5. Security Considerations
This document has only minor security considerations. It is hoped
that use of these reserved RFC numbers in testing will make some
documentation and referencing systems more robust and available.
Eastlake Expires 22 February 2024 [Page 3]
Internet-Draft Example RFC Numbers August 2023
6. Informative References
[RFCeditor]
The Internet Society, "RFC Editor",
<https://www.rfc-editor.org>.
[RFC2606] Eastlake 3rd, D. and A. Panitz, "Reserved Top Level DNS
Names", BCP 32, RFC 2606, DOI 10.17487/RFC2606, June 1999,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2606>.
[RFC5737] Arkko, J., Cotton, M., and L. Vegoda, "IPv4 Address Blocks
Reserved for Documentation", RFC 5737,
DOI 10.17487/RFC5737, January 2010,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5737>.
Acknowledgements
The idea behind this document was originated by Brian E. Carpenter.
The suggestions and comments of the following persons are gratefully
acknowledged: Andrew G. Malis, Martin J. Dürst, Tony L. Hansen.
Author's Address
Donald E. Eastlake 3rd
Futurewei Technologies
2386 Panoramic Circle
Apopka, Florida 32703
United States of America
Phone: +1-508-333-2270
Email: d3e3e3@gmail.com
Eastlake Expires 22 February 2024 [Page 4]
