The IETF Golden Rules

By Jacob Palme.

Disclaimer: This document presents the personal ideas of the author, and is not at present in any way certified by the IETF.

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Abstract

This memo presents the following rules, which to some extend can be regarded as the golden rules of IETF, even though there are exceptions when these rules should notg be adhered to.

1. Be liberal in what you accept, and conservative in what you send
2. Do not munge forwarded data
3. Modify as late as possible
4. Leave nothing undefined
5. Cause no harm
6. Keep it simple, stupid
7. No voting, rough consensus
8. Plain ASCII text is enough