Technical Summary
This specification defines registration procedures for the message
header field names used by Internet mail, HTTP, newsgroup feeds and
other Internet applications.
Benefits of a central registry for message header field names
include:
o providing a single point of reference for standardized and widely-
used header field names;
o providing a central point of discovery for established header
fields, and easy location of their defining documents;
o discouraging multiple definitions of a header field name for
different purposes;
o helping those proposing new header fields discern established
trends and conventions, and avoid names that might be confused
with existing ones;
o encouraging convergence of header field name usage across multiple
applications and protocols.
Working Group Summary
This has been reviewed in the IETF on the ietf-822@imc.org maiing list
but is not the product of an IETF Working Group.
Protocol Quality
Ned Freed reviewed the document for the IESG.
RFC Editor note
Please add a new section 3, Registry usage requirements, that says:
RFCs defining new header fields for Internet mail, HTTP, or MIME
MUST include appropriate header registration templates(s) (as
given in Section 3.2) for all headers defined in the document in their
IANA considerations section. Use of the header registry MAY be
mandated by other protocol specifications, however, in the absence
of such a mandate use of the registry is not required.
In section 3.2.1 "An header" should be "A header".
The third paragraph of section 3.4 should be changed to read:
Publication in an RFC or other form of Open Standard
document (per RFC 2026 [1], section 7) is sufficient grounds for
publication in the permanent registry.
At the end of the IANA considerations section replace the text
Initial header registrations are provided by the following companion
documents:
o For mail message headers: Registration of mail header fields [41]
o For HTTP message headers: Registration of HTTP header fields [42]
No initial entries are provided for the provisional registry.
with
No initial registry entries are provided.
and delete [41] and [42] from the references section.