One document matched: draft-carpenter-whats-an-author-00.txt

Network Working Group                                       B. Carpenter
Internet-Draft                                         Univ. of Auckland
Intended status: Informational                            April 24, 2015
Expires: October 26, 2015


               What is an Author of an IETF Stream Draft?
                   draft-carpenter-whats-an-author-00

Abstract

   This draft suggests guidelines for assigning authorship in IETF
   Internet-Drafts.  It also discusses the related issues of named
   contributors and acknowledgements.

Status of This Memo

   This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
   provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF).  Note that other groups may also distribute
   working documents as Internet-Drafts.  The list of current Internet-
   Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.

   Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
   and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
   time.  It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
   material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   This Internet-Draft will expire on October 26, 2015.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2015 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
   (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
   publication of this document.  Please review these documents
   carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
   to this document.  Code Components extracted from this document must
   include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
   the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
   described in the Simplified BSD License.





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Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction and Scope  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   2.  Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   3.  Contributors  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   4.  Editors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   5.  List of Acknowledgements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   6.  Intellectual Property Rights  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   7.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   8.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   9.  Acknowledgements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   10. Change log  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   11. Informative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   Author's Address  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4

1.  Introduction and Scope

   The question sometimes comes up of who should be listed as the
   author(s) of a draft, who should be listed as contributors, and what
   acknowledgements are appropriate.  The guidelines below are aimed at
   Internet-Drafts in the IETF publication stream [RFC5741].  They are
   intended to be compatible with the RFC Editor's style guide [RFC7322]
   and with the RFC Editor's authorship policies.

   This draft has been written purely to aid discussion and is not
   expected to be published as an RFC.

2.  Authors

   Authors are people who have made a substantial creative contribution
   to the document.  Normally this means writing text or drawing
   diagrams.  Occasionally, with the consent of the other authors, it
   means making some other substantial creative contribution to the
   document, for example by writing a software implementation as part of
   the design process.

   People who did not make any such substantial contribution should not
   be listed as authors.  In normal circumstances, people should not be
   listed as authors without their explicit permission.

   The practical impact is that the authors will be listed as such on
   the front page if the document becomes an RFC, and in public
   bibliographies.








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3.  Contributors

   Contributors are people who made smaller creative contributions to
   the document than the authors.

   People who did not make any such contribution should not be listed as
   contributors.  People should not normally be listed as contributors
   without their explicit permission.

   The dividing line between contributors and authors is a matter of
   judgement and cannot be rigidly defined.  However, the RFC Editor's
   policy is to query any document that has more than five listed
   authors.  Any list of more than five authors will need to be
   negotiated if the document is approved for publication as an RFC.

4.  Editors

   When a document has a large number of contributors and potential
   authors, it may be appropriate to designate one or two people as
   "Editors" and list all the others as contributors.  The editors will
   indeed do the actual work of editing the document on behalf of the
   community.  The practical impact of this is that the editors will be
   listed as such on the front page if the document becomes an RFC, and
   in public bibliographies.

5.  List of Acknowledgements

   Acknowledgements should be given to people who have made significant
   creative contributions smaller than those from the authors and
   contributors, or to people who have made useful comments, provided
   critical reviews, or otherwise contributed significantly to the
   development of the document.  Acknowledgements may also be given to
   people or organizations that have given material support and
   assistance, but this should not include the authors' regular
   employers.

   An acknowledgement does not signify that the person acknowledged
   agrees with the document.  In general, people who do not wish to be
   listed as an author or a contributor, but have in fact made a
   significant contribution, should be given an acknowledgement.

6.  Intellectual Property Rights

   None of the above affects intellectual property rights.  Copyright in
   IETF documents is governed by BCP 78 [RFC5378] and its predecessors,
   the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions, and applicable national and
   international law.




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   The word "contributor" used in this draft does not mean the same
   thing as the word "Contributor" used in BCP 79 [RFC3979], which is
   broader.  That BCP should be consulted by anyone concerned about the
   IETF requirement for disclosure of intellectual property rights.

7.  Security Considerations

   None, really.

8.  IANA Considerations

   This memo includes no request to IANA.

9.  Acknowledgements

   Valuable comments were received from TBD.

10.  Change log

   draft-carpenter-whats-an-author-00, 2015-04-24: original version.

11.  Informative References

   [RFC3979]  Bradner, S., "Intellectual Property Rights in IETF
              Technology", BCP 79, RFC 3979, March 2005.

   [RFC5378]  Bradner, S. and J. Contreras, "Rights Contributors Provide
              to the IETF Trust", BCP 78, RFC 5378, November 2008.

   [RFC5741]  Daigle, L., Kolkman, O., and IAB, "RFC Streams, Headers,
              and Boilerplates", RFC 5741, December 2009.

   [RFC7322]  Flanagan, H. and S. Ginoza, "RFC Style Guide", RFC 7322,
              September 2014.

Author's Address

   Brian Carpenter
   Department of Computer Science
   University of Auckland
   PB 92019
   Auckland  1142
   New Zealand

   Email: brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com






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