Subject: ASCII, Postscript or PDF in IETF drafts

From: Jacob Palme <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 11:23:12 +0200

At present, RFCs can be supplied in either ASCII only, or in both 
ASCII and Postscript format. However, the PDF format has some 
advantages compared to Postscript:

(1) Much much smaller files

(2) More platform-independent

Both Postscript and PDF are formats controlled by a commercial 
company, ADOBE. There are products which can produce and read these 
formats from multiple manufacturers. However, products to print PDF 
seem to be mostly from ADOBE. The reason for this is that ADOBE 
provides free PDF print programs of good quality, so there is no 
commercial market for selling PDF print programs.

A few years ago, there were many competing formats to PDF. Now,
however, PDF seems to be totally dominating the market for exchange
of formatted documents in layout format. As other manufacturers
than ADOBE are using PDF, it has become a de facto standard in
the same way as Postscript.

I suggest that PDF replaces Postscript as the secondary RFC format.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jacob Palme <[email-masked]> (Stockholm University and KTH)
for more info see URL: http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme

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From: [email-masked]
Date: 16 Aug 99 10:38:00 UT

uh oh, please not, PS is a really nice abstract format while
PDF is sortof compiled in diffrent versions. On the other hand
there are many Postscript printers around and not so much PDF-Printers :-)

Greets,
Thomas

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From: "Jo�l-Ren� Cuvellier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 16:32:49 +0200

Postscript and Acrobat are proprietary softwares and formats (both from
Adobe). Albeit their qualities, HTML is concise, it is not bound to any
firm and flexible enough to match any kind of document requirements.

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From: "Jo�l-Ren� Cuvellier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 16:32:49 +0200

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From: "Marshall Rose" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 09:35:06 -0600

may i suggest that someone outline the goals of an additional format before
arguing for/against a particular choice?

for example, when carl and i came up with the idea for rfc2629 (xml as a
format), we had some very specific problems we were trying to address. when
rfc2629 was written, those goals were documented. you may agree/disagree
with the choice of xml, you may even agree/disagree with our goals, but at
least you have the context in which to have a discussion...

/mtr

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From: "Marshall Rose" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 09:35:06 -0600

/mtr

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From: "Jo�l-Ren� Cuvellier" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 19:16:39 +0200

From: Karl Auerbach <[email-masked]>
>My own preference is to follow direction pointed out by Marshall Rose >in "Writing I-Ds and RFCs using XML" RFC2629.
Yes, indeed, XML should be a good format, but it is rather new, maybe
it's an opportunity to popularize it faster?

>Yes, drawings and graphics would still be an nuisance.
Not at all, drawing and graphics can afford very much. However grep
cannot be used inside but the legend - or the tag - may be scanned.

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From: Steve Blake <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 15:28:32 -0400

> Yes, drawings and graphics would still be an nuisance.

Which SVG will someday hopefully fix.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Steven L. Blake                  <[email-masked]>
Ericsson IP Infrastructure             (919)468-8466 x232

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From: Steve Blake <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 1999 15:28:32 -0400

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From: Graham Klyne <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Aug 1999 07:18:21 +0100

At 15:00 16/08/99 +0100, Lloyd Wood wrote:

>Please evaluate the Windows-only-so-far Acrobat pdf 4.0, with added
>forms and Javascript(!) before making that claim. It's a major step
>backwards from 2.1/3.0.

Eek!  I didn't know that (Javascript in PDF).

After the problems with Word-based macro viruses and worms, I'd say the
last thing we want is a "universal" document format containing "active
code", for IETF or any other purpose.  (For me, the assurances of security
for such systems are not convincing.)

#g

------------
Graham Klyne
([email-masked])

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From: Graham Klyne <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Aug 1999 07:18:21 +0100

#g

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Graham Klyne
([email-masked])