Subject: [Speermint] FW: IESG Statement: Normative and Informative References

From: "Livingood, Jason" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Apr 2006 11:19:00 -0400

FYI 

-----Original Message-----
From: IESG Secretary [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Wednesday, April 19, 2006 9:50 AM
To: IETF Announcement list
Subject: IESG Statement: Normative and Informative References 

Normative and Informative References

Nearly all RFCs contain citations to other documents, and these are
listed in a References section near the end of the RFC. There are many
styles for references, and the RFCs have one of their own. Please follow
the reference style used in recent RFCs. Please note that for documents
that have been assigned an STD or BCP number, the number must be
included in the reference.

Within an RFC, references to other documents fall into two general
categories: "normative" and "informative". Normative references specify
documents that must be read to understand or implement the technology in
the new RFC, or whose technology must be present for the technology in
the new RFC to work. An informative reference is not normative; rather,
it only provides additional information. For example, an informative
reference might provide background or historical information.
Informative references are not required to implement the technology in
the RFC.

Note 1: Even references that are relevant only for optional features
must be classified as normative if they meet the above conditions for
normative references.

Note 2: It is not considered necessary to cite basic specifications that
may be safely assumed to be known to practitioners (for example, RFC 791
need not be cited in every specification that mentions IPv4).

Note 3: The normative/informative distinction is relevant in any
document that amounts to a technical specification, even if its intended
status is Experimental or Informational.

Note 4: Normative references in RFCs cannot be to "work in progress"
documents such as Internet Drafts. Drafts with such references will not
be published as RFCs until the references are also published.

The distinction between normative and informative references is often
important. The IETF standards process according to RFC 2026 and RFC
3967, and the RFC Editor publication process, both need to know whether
a reference to a work in progress is normative. An RFC cannot be
published until all of the documents that it lists as normative
references have been published. In practice, this often results in the
simultaneous publication of a group of interrelated RFCs.

For these reasons, the IESG and the RFC Editor have established
guidelines that will request separate reference lists for normative and
informative references in Internet Drafts and RFCs. For example, if both
types are present, there would be two reference subsections, numbered
s.1 and s.2 for example:

s.1. Normative References

xxx
...
xxx

s.2. Informative References

xxx
...
xxx

Of course, if there is only one type of reference, only one section is
needed.

The IESG

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