{"draft":"draft-klensin-norm-ref-04","doc_id":"RFC4897","title":"Handling Normative References to Standards-Track Documents","authors":["J. Klensin","S. Hartman"],"format":["ASCII","HTML"],"page_count":"6","pub_status":"BEST CURRENT PRACTICE","status":"BEST CURRENT PRACTICE","source":"IETF - NON WORKING GROUP","abstract":"The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and Request for Comments\r\n(RFC) Editor have a long-standing rule that a document at a given\r\nmaturity level cannot be published until all of the documents that it\r\nreferences as normative are at that maturity level or higher.  This\r\nrule has sometimes resulted in very long publication delays for\r\ndocuments and some claims that it was a major obstruction to\r\nadvancing documents in maturity level.  The IETF agreed on a way to\r\nbypass this rule with RFC 3967.  This document describes a simpler\r\nprocedure for downward references to Standards-Track and Best Current\r\nPractice (BCP) documents, namely \"note and move on\".  The procedure\r\nin RFC 3967 still applies for downward references to other classes of\r\ndocuments.  In both cases, annotations should be added to such\r\nReferences.  This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the\r\nInternet Community, and requests discussion and suggestions for\r\nimprovements.","pub_date":"June 2007","keywords":["[--------|b]"],"obsoletes":[],"obsoleted_by":[],"updates":["RFC3967"],"updated_by":[],"see_also":["BCP0097"],"doi":"10.17487\/RFC4897","errata_url":"https:\/\/www.rfc-editor.org\/errata\/rfc4897"}