Joyce Reynolds
ISI
Tuesday, July 20
11th floor large CR

The Request for Comments (RFC) Series

On the 7th of April 1969, the first Request for Comments (RFC) was published. RFC 1 was the first of the series that currently contains more than 3800 documents. Documents in the RFC series discuss many aspects of computer networking, including protocols, procedures, programs, and concepts, as well as meeting notes, opinions, and sometimes humor.

For 28 of the 35 years of its existence, the "shepherd" of the RFCs was Jon Postel. He collected, edited, published, and archived the documents for the community. This presentation will provide a history of the RFC series of notes, its evolution, the process on how a document becomes an "RFC-to-be", and its importance as the official publication vehicle for Internet standards.