rfcseries-wg / new-topics

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Separate out designing for authoring from designing for publishing #23

Open JayDaley opened 1 year ago

JayDaley commented 1 year ago

The RFCs on RFCXML ('xml2rfc vocabulary') partially separate out authoring from publishing with the concept of prepping and prep tool but they otherwise assume that the requirements for publishing are the same requirements as for authoring. It would be better to separate these two out and consider the requirements and issues separately, while recognising they are part of an overall system.

For example, an XML based language was chosen as the archiving format but if we had considered what was the best format solely for authoring, a different conclusion may have been reached.

As another example, collaboration is a key part of authoring not publishing and yet RFC 6949 does not consider collaboration at all. RFC 6949 barely consider any authoring-specific concerns.

paulehoffman commented 1 year ago

To make things more complicated: this issue talks about authoring and archiving, but not publishing. The v3 format was chosen primarily for its utility in publishing (as plain XML, and converted to HTML, PDF, and plain text), with a nod toward authoring. Archiving can be done with any bits on the wire.