RFC 1539 (rfc1539) - Page 3 of 22

The Tao of IETF - A Guide for New Attendees of the Internet Engineering Task Force

RFC 1539                    The Tao of IETF                 October 1993


   o  Specifying the development or usage of protocols and the near-term
      architecture to solve such technical problems for the Internet;

   o  Making recommendations to the Internet Engineering Steering Group
      (IESG) regarding the standardization of protocols and protocol
      usage in the Internet;

   o  Facilitating technology transfer from the Internet Research Task
      Force (IRTF) to the wider Internet community; and

   o  Providing a forum for the exchange of information within the
      Internet community between vendors, users, researchers, agency
      contractors, and network managers.

   The IETF Plenary meeting is not a conference, although there are
   technical presentations.  The IETF is not a traditional standards
   organization, although many standards are produced.  The IETF is the
   volunteers who meet three times a year to fulfill the IETF mission.

   There is no membership in the IETF.  Anyone may register for and
   attend any meeting.  The closest thing there is to being an IETF
   member is being on the IETF or Working Group mailing lists (see the
   IETF Mailing Lists section).  This is where the best information
   about current IETF activities and focus can be found.


Humble Beginnings

   The first IETF meeting was held in January, 1986 at Linkabit in San
   Diego with 15 attendees.  The 4th IETF, held at SRI in Menlo Park in
   October, 1986, was the first at which non-government vendors
   attended.  The concept of Working Groups (WG) was introduced at the
   5th IETF meeting at the NASA Ames Research Center in California in
   February, 1987.  The 7th IETF, held at MITRE in McLean, Virginia in
   July, 1987, was the first meeting with over 100 attendees.

   The 14th IETF meeting was held at Stanford University in July, 1989.
   It marked a major change in the structure of the IETF universe.  The
   IAB (then Internet Activities Board, now Internet Architecture
   Board), which until that time oversaw many Task Forces, changed its
   structure to leave only two: the IETF and the IRTF.  The IRTF is
   tasked to consider the long-term research problems in the Internet.
   The IETF also changed at that time.








Internet Engineering Task Force