Subject: Draft IESG Statement Regarding Ethertype Requests

From: IETF Chair <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2012 12:40:08 -0400

Last week the IAB and the IESG met with the leadership of IEEE 802.  One of the things that was discussed was the IEEE policies for allocating EtherTypes, and the IESG is considering the attached IESG Statement to implement an IETF policy that aligns with the IEEE policy.

If you have an comments on this proposed policy, please raise them on [email-masked].

Russ

= = = = = = 

The IEEE Registration Authority Committee (RAC) assigns Ethertypes.
(See http://standards.ieee.org/develop/regauth/ethertype/.)  Some IETF
protocol specification make use of Ethertypes.  Since Ethertypes are a
fairly scarce resource, the IEEE RAC will not assign an Ethertype to a
new IETF protocol specification that needs a new Ethertype until the
IESG has approved the specification for publication as an RFC.

To let the IEEE RAC know that the IESG has approved an IETF protocol
specification for publication, all future requests for assignment of
Ethertypes for IETF protocol specifications will be made by the IESG.

Note that playpen Ethertypes have been assigned in IEEE 802 [1] for use
during development and experimentation.

[1] IEEE Std 802a-2003 (Amendment to IEEE Std 802-2001).
    IEEE standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks:
    Overview and Architecture -- Amendment 1: Ethertypes for
    Prototype and Vendor-Specific Protocol Development.

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From: "Romascanu, Dan (Dan)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2012 23:20:38 +0200

(I hope not to open some Pandora box or a long thread - my goal is to
make sure there is clarity in the language of the statement)

What 'IETF protocol specification' means here? 

Pretty clear it covers protocols defined in IETF standards-track
documents. 

Does it also cover protocols defined (described) in Informational RFCs
which are part of the IETF stream? 

Dan

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] [mailto:ietf-announce-
> [email-masked]] On Behalf Of IETF Chair
> Sent: Monday, July 30, 2012 7:40 PM
> To: IETF Announce
> Cc: IETF
> Subject: Draft IESG Statement Regarding Ethertype Requests
> 
> Last week the IAB and the IESG met with the leadership of IEEE 802.
One
> of the things that was discussed was the IEEE policies for allocating
> EtherTypes, and the IESG is considering the attached IESG Statement to
> implement an IETF policy that aligns with the IEEE policy.
>

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2012 18:53:17 -0400

Dan:

Only protocol specifications make use of Ethertypes.  The statement is intended to apply to any protocol specification on the IETF Stream (Standards Track RFC, Informational RFC, or Experimental RFC) that needs to allocate a new Ethertype.

Russ