Network Working Group J. Flick Request for Comments: 3638 Hewlett-Packard Company Obsoletes: 1643 C. Heard Category: Informational Consultant September 2003
Applicability Statement for Reclassification of RFC 1643 to Historic Status
Status of this Memo
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Copyright Notice
Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2003). All Rights Reserved.
Abstract
This memo recommends that RFC 1643 be reclassified as an Historic document and provides the supporting motivation for that recommendation.
STD 50, RFC 1643 [RFC1643], "Definitions of Managed Objects for the Ethernet-like Interface Types", and its SMIv2 equivalent, RFC 1650 [RFC1650], are applicable to half-duplex 10 Mb/s Ethernet interfaces only. Subsequent to the 1994 publication of these documents, 100 Mb/s, 1000 Mb/s, and 10 Gb/s Ethernet interface types have been developed, and full-duplex operation at 10 Mb/s has been standardized. Updates to RFC 1650 have been produced to accommodate these new technologies [RFC2358] [RFC2665] [RFC2666] [RFC3635]. These updates define new MIB objects to supplement those defined in RFC 1643 and RFC 1650 and in addition deprecate some of the objects in RFC 1643 and RFC 1650 that are no longer considered useful. They also levy a requirement for implementations of the EtherLike-MIB to support the MAU-MIB [RFC2239] [RFC2668] [RFC3636] as well.
Flick & Heard Informational [Page 1]
RFC 3638 RFC 1643 to Historic Status September 2003
RFC 1643 is an obsolete specification, overtaken by events. Its SMIv2 equivalent, RFC 1650, was officially retired in 1998. New implementations -- even those that support only half-duplex 10 Mb/s interfaces -- should comply with in the latest version of the specification, currently RFC 3635 [RFC3635] and RFC 2666 [RFC2666], instead of RFC 1643. It is therefore recommended that RFC 1643 be reclassified as an Historic document.
Reclassification of RFC 1643 will have no impact on the status of any standards track RFC because no standards track RFC cites it as a normative reference. An RFC content search made with the tools available at http://www.rfc-editor.org reveals the following standards track documents that cite RFC 1643:
RFC 3635 Definitions of Managed Objects for the Ethernet-like Interface Types
RFC 2020 [RFC2020] contains DOT12-IF-MIB, which is the MIB module for managing IEEE 802.12 100VG-AnyLAN interfaces. It refers to RFC 1643 in the context of an admonition not to implement the EtherLike-MIB for any interface where the DOT12-IF-MIB is implemented.
RFC 2358 [RFC2358], RFC 2665 [RFC2665], and RFC 3635 [RFC3635] all contain updated versions of the EtherLike-MIB. They refer to RFC 1643 in the context of explaining the history of the EtherLike-MIB, and the citation in RFC 3635 is explicitly listed as a non-normative reference.
RFC 2720 [RFC2720] contains the FLOW-METER-MIB. It refers to RFC 1643 only in an ASN.1 comment in the MIB module. Omission of that comment would not preclude correct implementation of the MIB module.
Clearly, none of these citations are normative.
Flick & Heard Informational [Page 2]
RFC 3638 RFC 1643 to Historic Status September 2003
[RFC2239] de Graaf, K., Romascanu, D., McMaster, D., McCloghrie, K. and S. Roberts, "Definitions of Managed Objects for IEEE 802.3 Medium Attachment Units (MAUs) using SMIv2", RFC 2239, November 1997.
[RFC2358] Flick, J. and J. Johnson, "Definitions of Managed Objects for the Ethernet-like Interface Types", RFC 2358, June 1998.
[RFC2665] Flick, J. and J. Johnson, "Definitions of Managed Objects for the Ethernet-like Interface Types", RFC 2665, August 1999.
[RFC2666] Flick, J., "Definitions of Object Identifiers for Identifying Ethernet Chip Sets", RFC 2666, August 1999.
[RFC2668] Smith, A., Flick, J., deGraaf, K., Romascanu, D., McMaster, D., McCloghrie, K. and S. Roberts, "Definitions of Managed Objects for IEEE 802.3 Medium Attachment Units (MAUs)", RFC 2668, August 1999.
[RFC2720] Brownlee, N., "Traffic Flow Measurement: Meter MIB", RFC 2720, October 1999.
[RFC3635] Flick, J., "Definitions of Managed Objects for the Ethernet-like Interface Types", RFC 3635, September 2003.
Flick & Heard Informational [Page 3]
RFC 3638 RFC 1643 to Historic Status September 2003
[RFC3636] Flick, J., "Definitions of Managed Objects for IEEE 802.3 Medium Attachment Units (MAUs)", RFC 3636, September 2003.
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