There is no way this is an erratum. There was a clear choice in the WG to standardise on lower case.
There could be no objection to a presentation-layer choice to display upper case in a GUI as a matter of user preference. However, I was surprised by the suggestion that upper case is better for people with limited visual acuity. My eyes are well past their use-by date and I haven't found this to be an issue. There is evidence for upper case being better *for a given font size*: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2016788/ Therefore, another GUI option could be to use a bigger font size. In any case I would object to this erratum being accepted. Regards Brian Carpenter P.S. > Many other pre-1990 computer science and engineering books show hexidecimal > non-decimal digits as upper case only I would like to report an erratum in that sentence: s/hexidecimal/hexadecimal/ More seriously, many computers in the early days only knew how to print upper case; hence there was a strong bias against lower case in both software and documentation. It's no surprise that the ancient scrolls use upper case. However, I have a copy of "Electronic Digital Computers" by Charles V.L Smith (of the Aberdeen Proving Ground), published in 1959 by McGraw-Hill, which on page 4 refers to "sexadecimal" notation (you gotta love that) in which "the first six lower-case letters of the alphabet a, b, c, d, e, and f, may conveniently be used." I think that trumps the references below in terms of age. On 2010-12-03 10:17, RFC Errata System wrote: > The following errata report has been submitted for RFC5952, > "A Recommendation for IPv6 Address Text Representation". > > -------------------------------------- > You may review the report below and at: > http://www.rfc-editor.org/errata_search.php?rfc=5952&eid=2656 > > -------------------------------------- > Type: Technical > Reported by: D. Stussy <d.stu...@yahoo.com> > > Section: 4.3 > > Original Text > ------------- > 4.3. Lowercase > > The characters "a", "b", "c", "d", "e", and "f" in an IPv6 address > MUST be represented in lowercase. > > > Corrected Text > -------------- > 4.3. Case of Alphabetic Digits. > > The digits "A" through "F" in an IPv6 address > MUST be represented in upper case. User and user > derived input may be represented using lower case. > > > Notes > ----- > Historically from the 1960's, hexidecimal digits other than decimal digits > are represented by upper case letters. Lower case letters may have become > acceptable as user input, but such resulted from lazy programmers who > couldn't manage to hit the shift key on their keyboards. However, lower case > is not acceptable for digit output. Many early assemblers would not even > accept lower case as valid input digits except where the radix base exceeded > 36 (thus exhausting all upper case values). This poor programming practice > should not be allowed to be codified into any Internet standard. > > References: > - Struble, George W., "Assembler Language Programming: The IBM System/360 > and /370." Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., 1969 and 1975 (Second Edition), > Page 6. ISBN 0-201-7322-6 > - Barden, William Jr., "TRS-80 Assembly-Language Programming." Tandy > Corporation, 1979, page 14. Library of Congress #79-63607 > - Leventhal, Lance A., "6502 Assembly Language Programming." Osborne > McGraw-Hill, 1979 and 1986 (Second Edition), Page 1-4. ISBN 0-07-881216-X > - Intel Corporation, "Intel486 Microprocessor Family Programmer's Reference > Manual." 1995, Page 1-8 (Section 1.3.4). No ISBN or LoC #. > - Cress, Paul, Dirksen, Paul, and Grahm, J. Wesley, "Fortran IV with WatFor > and WatFiv." Prentice-Hall, 1968 and 1970, Page 245. LoC 74-129241 > - Mano, M. Morris, "Computer System Architecture." Prentice-Hall, 1982, Page > 79. ISBN 0-13-166611-8 > - Higgins, Richard J., "Electronics with Digital and Analog Integrated > Circuits." Prentice-Hall, 1983, Page 60. ISBN 0-13-250704-8 > > However, I also note this ONE source permits mixed case: > - Kernighan, Brian W. & Ritchie, Dennis M., "The C Programming Language", > Prentice Hall, 1978 (First Edition), Page 180. ISBN 0-13-110163-3 > > Many other pre-1990 computer science and engineering books show hexidecimal > non-decimal digits as upper case only and NEVER as lower case. However, I > could not find pages in them defining the lettered-digits as upper case only > despite their consistent usage of upper case printing. > > Instructions: > ------------- > This errata is currently posted as "Reported". If necessary, please > use "Reply All" to discuss whether it should be verified or > rejected. When a decision is reached, the verifying party (IESG) > can log in to change the status and edit the report, if necessary. > > -------------------------------------- > RFC5952 (draft-ietf-6man-text-addr-representation-07) > -------------------------------------- > Title : A Recommendation for IPv6 Address Text Representation > Publication Date : August 2010 > Author(s) : S. Kawamura, M. Kawashima > Category : PROPOSED STANDARD > Source : IPv6 Maintenance > Area : Internet > Stream : IETF > Verifying Party : IESG > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > IETF IPv6 working group mailing list > ipv6@ietf.org > Administrative Requests: https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ipv6 > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > -------------------------------------------------------------------- IETF IPv6 working group mailing list ipv6@ietf.org Administrative Requests: https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ipv6 --------------------------------------------------------------------
