RFC
Request For Comments
Top 100 RFC's (the most popular) - 1 to 50 51 to 100
The Request for Comments (RFC) are text documents of the Internet research and development community. You will see them referenced everywhere when reading about networks and data communications, particularly Internet standards. Here is a great Audio/Slide Show RFC description.
The term is wrong and confusing - is a holdover from the initial days of the net when things were still being developed. It is not a document that requests comments !!! Rather, it is a document of the comments themselves. We usually think of comments as casual statements. But an RFC contains in-depth, highly technical details. Just think of an RFC as a technical document that may or may not be a standard. Not all RFC's are standards !!! An RFC can be classified as "information", "experimental", "historical", etc. For the most part, an RFC is either a standard, or just info - however, most people even view the information RFC's as standards, since they are so highly regarded. Their content is seen as the bible of the Internet.
Finding an RFC
There are several repositories for the RFC's - the official repository is http://www.rfc-editor.org - however, it is often very slow. Here is the best location for fast display of any RFC:
http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc2396.html
Click on the link to go there, then replace the 2396 with whatever RFC you are looking for.
It's also a great site for any FAQ you can imagine, on every topic !!
Another fast retreival is the IETF site - go here and enter the RFC number: http://www.ietf.org/rfc.html
To find quick info, such as the Date, Author, Status, and RFC's that Obsolete another - also If you do not know the number of an RFC but have other info such as the author, title, and/or keywords:
The RFC Process (see RFC 2400 for details on this)
Absolutely anyone can fill out a form on www.ietf.org to submit a proposed standard. Of course, it is unlikely to be accepted unless it can pass rigorous inspection by the IETF. If accepted it becomes an "Internet draft" (here is the list of current Internet Drafts). If the Internet draft is accepted (and this can take quite a while), it then is called an RFC and is assigned an RFC reference number.
However, just because a draft has become an RFC does not mean it is finalized. There are in fact different levels of RFC, ranging from "still being developed, subject to change without notice", up to "mandatory, every system on the Internet must implement this as described".
Obsolete RFC's
The RFC's do not list accurate info on their obsolescence !!! You must use the rfc-editor search engine for that !!
Many RFC's are made to update older, obsolete RFC's. Each RFC says which RFC's it has made obsolete. Unfortunately, obsolete RFC's do not say that they are obsolete in the text. You can use the Search the RFC index for that info.
For example, RFC 1540 - the actual RFC text document says:
Request for Comments: 1540
Obsoletes: RFCs 1500, 1410, 1360, 1280, 1250, 1100, 1083, 1130, 1140, 1200
Category: Standards Track
It says it replaces all 10 of the other RFC's. But it does not list the RFC's that came after that and obsoleted 1540 !!
But you can track this down using the RFC Search engine. For 1540 it says:
1540 Obsoletes RFC1500, Obsoleted by RFC1600 and then you must work your way forward from there.
In most cases the replacement RFC's do indeed contain the same info and either add more or make corrections. But sometimes they leave out huge amounts of info !!!!! As an extreme example RFC 1083 was replaced by a long series of RFC's. 1083 described the standardization process of RFC's. It was fine all the way up to RFC2400. Each subsequent RFC's added valuable info and made corrections/clarifications.
The RFC2500 Problem
But for some reason the IETF actually messed up here. RFC2500, which is said to replace 2400 - changed everything !! It listed nothing about the process, and instead simply listed all the RFC's and a brief description of each !! That format then continued all the way until the last one in the series, RFC 3300.
we track it all down using the search engine. The series actually started at 1083:
1083 Obsoleted by RFC1100
1100 Obsoletes RFC1083, Obsoleted by RFC1130
1130 Obsoletes RFC1100, Obsoleted by RFC1140
1140 Obsoletes RFC1130, Obsoleted by RFC1200
1200 Obsoletes RFC1140, Obsoleted by RFC1250
1250 Obsoletes RFC1200, Obsoleted by RFC2200, RFC1280
NOTE: here, the 2200 is a hint that you can skip directly to that RFC in your search, instead of going to 1280, but we will continue the long way just to show how crazy this gets !!!
1280 Obsoletes RFC1250, Obsoleted by RFC1360
1360 Obsoletes RFC1280, Obsoleted by RFC1410
1400 Obsoletes RFC1360, Obsoleted by RFC1500
1500 Obsoletes RFC1410, Obsoleted by RFC1540
1540 Obsoletes RFC1500, Obsoleted by RFC1600
1600 Obsoletes RFC1540, Obsoleted by RFC1610
1610 Obsoletes RFC1600, Obsoleted by RFC1720
1720 Obsoletes RFC1610, Obsoleted by RFC1780
1780 Obsoletes RFC1720, Obsoleted by RFC1800
1800 Obsoletes RFC1780, Obsoleted by RFC1880
1880 Obsoletes RFC1800, Obsoleted by RFC1920
1920 Obsoletes RFC1880, Obsoleted by RFC2000
2000 Obsoletes RFC1920, Obsoleted by RFC2200
2200 Obsoletes RFC1250, RFC2000, Obsoleted by RFC2300
2300 Obsoletes RFC2200, Obsoleted by RFC2400
2400 Obsoletes RFC2300, Obsoleted by RFC2500 (wrong !!! 2500 is a completely different document - not related to 2400)
2500 Obsoletes RFC2400, Obsoleted by RFC2600
2600 Obsoletes RFC2500, Obsoleted by RFC2700
2700 Obsoletes RFC2600, Obsoleted by RFC2800
2800 Obsoletes RFC2700, Obsoleted by RFC2900
2900 Obsoletes RFC2800, Obsoleted by RFC3000
3000 Obsoletes RFC2900, Obsoleted by RFC3300
3300 Obsoletes 3000
The End !!!
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