Description: This tutorial provides introductions to a number of aspects of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) history, structure and operations. It is presented the Sunday before every IETF meeting and, when possible, it's also provided in the local language where the meeting is taking place.
Scott Bradner, who revised and presented this tutorial at the IETF for many years, produced a series of bite-sized IETF introductory videos specifically designed for online viewing for his Harvard University Extension School class. The Harvard Extension School graciously agreed to close caption the videos and let the IETF make them available for general viewing. The YouTube playlist of these Newcomers Training videos can be found here.
Links to the recording of the newcomers tutorial as delivered at a recent IETF meeting can be found below.
Description: When the IETF meets where English is not the native language, the Edu Team often provides the Newcomers Tutorial in the local language. You can find Newcomer Tutorial slides in French, Mandarin, etc.
Description: This session will provide information to IETF participants and leaders on how to bring new work into the IETF, including how to bring a document into an existing WG, how to organize a BoF, and how to form a new IETF WG. Although this information is intended to encourage participants to bring interesting new work into the IETF, the class will also cover the IPR and control implications of pursuing work within the IETF.
Description: Privacy, as with security, has received increasing attention over the
last few years as the number of security incidents and privacy
violations increased. While security guidance has been offered in RFC
3552 and has been part of the IETF education tutorial for many years
privacy related guidance has only been available recently with the
publication of RFC 6973. This tutorial aims to provide the audience a
brief overview of the privacy threats that engineers may encounter
during their protocol work.
A core part of RFC 6973 is on offering guidance, i.e., a
set of questions an engineer should ask himself or herself when
designing new protocols or protocol extensions to take common privacy
concerns into account.
Description:We're pretty well used to having document shepherds by now. RFC 4858 talks about "Document Shepherding from Working Group Last Call to Publication", but there's a significant part of a document's life that happens before working group last call, starting at the time that a working group begins discussing a version of the idea that's been posted as an individual draft. This session will discuss the job of the document shepherd, the tasks that might be involved throughout a working group document's lifecycle from start to finish, and the potential for extending document shepherding into earlier stages in that lifecycle.
Last time presented: Prague, Czech Republic at IETF 93 Link to slides:Document Editing and Shepherding
Document Lifecycle
Description: This tutorial offers an overview of producing documents in the IETF,
from version 00 of an Internet-Draft to publication as an RFC. We will
cover the working group process, and the required and suggested contents
of an Internet-Draft, including information from IANA staff about
writing IANA Considerations sections. We will walk through the lifecyle
including authorship, WG draft, IETF Last Call, IESG evaluation, and
what to expect during the RFC publication process. We will provide a set
of helpful hints to authors about formatting rules and editorial
policies that often improve the quality of the resulting documents. We
will summarize the states of the RFC publication process and provide an
opportunity to ask questions of RFC Editor staff.
Last time presented: Taipei, Taiwan at IETF 82 Link to slides:Document Lifecycle
IETF Tools Training
Description:This tutorial is intended to help IETF participants to make use of the tools provided by the IETF tools team. There will be a short overview of each tool plus a demo of the essential functionality.
Introduction to centralized Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (AAA) management for distributed IP networks
Description: RADIUS (RFC 2865) and Diameter (RFC 6733) are two IETF standard protocols specified since early 2000s for providing remote and centralized Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (AAA) management in IP networks. This tutorial offers an overview of these two protocols, along with their similarities and differences. Examples of concrete AAA applications in everyday life of an Internet user will be used for illustration. The aim is to familiarize newcomers with RADIUS and Diameter as well as provide network/service operators with guidelines for selecting the appropriate AAA solution (including the various extensions).
Description: This session will provide a high level overview of Application building
blocks being developed and maintained in the Applications Area. We will
talk about major groups of specialized application protocols (HTTP,
email, simple resource manipulation mechanisms for devices in
constrained networks ["CORE"]), protocols for Internet infrastructure
(e.g. IDNA and EPP), as well as "building block" protocols and formats
that are designed to be used in a variety of more specific applications
(e.g. LDAP, MIME types, URI schemes, URNs, language tags, XML and JSON).
Description: This session provides a high level overview of the Internet Area, including the core protocol building blocks developed and maintained by the area. A brief summary of the topics currently covered by the area as well as a short introduction to the working groups in the area is also covered.
Introduction to Real-Time Applications and Infrastructure Development
Description: This session will provide a high level overview of the real-time communication building blocks being developed and maintained in the RAI Area. We will touch on how the protocols used for real-time voice and video currently fit together and how recent developments are pressuring those protocols to change.
Description: This session will provide a high-level overview of the Security Area including building blocks developed and maintained by the area. We will begin with a brief overview of security services (e.g., authentication, confidentiality) followed by mechanisms to provide these services. We will talk about Security Area groups (TLS, DANE, OAuth, etc.) as well as other areas’ groups that are security focused -- IRTF’s CFRG, Routing Security, Applications.
Description: This session will provide a high level overview of the Transport and
Services (TSV) Area, which works on mechanisms related to end-to-end
data transport. TSV working groups cover core transport protocols, such
as TCP, UDP, DCCP, and SCTP; congestion mitigation and notification;
middlebox services, such as firewalls and IPv4/IPv6 network address
translation; coordinating/transporting network storage, such as iSCSI,
iFC, and NFS; and congestion avoidance by coordinating/optimizing
traffic flows. The tutorial will give an overview of present work,
briefly cover the history of the TSV area, and summarize current
developments with respect to the future of the TSV area's work and
organization.
Description: xml2rfc is becoming increasingly popular as a way to produce Internet
Drafts (and RFCs). This tutorial will introduce the markup language
used in xml2rfc and describe a selection of the tools (both free and
paid for) that can be used to create the marked up text and turn it into
the finished document in normative ASCII, HTML for more elegant web
usage or nroff as used for the RFC masters. The tutorial will start
with a very brief introduction to XML markup for complete novices and
will cover the usage of the 'processing instructions' that are available
to control the appearance of the final document. The set of elements
used in xml2rfc has been deliberately kept very small so that it is very
easy to learn basic usage of the language. As a result there isn't
always an obvious way to achieve certain effects so a number of useful
'tricks and tips' will be covered that provide the 'cliche' needed as
solutions to Frequently Asked Questions and highlight some of the
pitfalls so that editors can avoid having to tear out their hair just
before draft deadline time. Using xml2rfc relieves draft editors of the
need to think about the overhead of getting the boilerplate and overall
format right, and provides automated bibliographies that reduce the pain
of generating references to existing drafts, RFCs and some other
standard document series. The RFC Editor is increasingly using xml2rfc
as a way to generate the source of the published RFC so that providing
xml2rfc source can help reduce the turnround time when a draft is being
converted into an RFC.
Description: Presenting at the IETF is different than most other venues. The combination of language differences, deeply technical topics, and varying goals makes for a unique challenge. In this presentation, we will describe some simple tips to help your IETF presentation be as effective as possible.
Last time presented: Honolulu, HI, USA at IETF 91 Link to slides:Presentation Skills
RFC Editors Training
Description: This class covers the basics required to produced a well formed RFC. Although hosted by the EDU Team, this class is typically taught by a member of the RFC Editor staff.
Description: This session will provide an overview of the work and activities in the Routing (RTG) Area of the IETF. The purpose of the tutorial is not to explain the routing protocols, but to describe the history and purpose of the Routing Area as well as to provide an overview of the current work in the area. It will show how the various working groups relate to each other and to working groups in other areas. Finally, the session will consider how routing-related work in other areas can access and benefit from the expertise available in the Routing Area.
Last time presented: Prague, Czech Republic at IETF 93 Link to slides:Routing Area Overview
Tools for Creating Internet Drafts and RFCs
Description:This tutorial will cover NroffEdit and xml2rfc, two popular ways to produce Internet-Drafts. NroffEdit is a WYSIWYG nroff editor that comes with a template for quick creation of an Internet-Draft. We will cover the essential NROFF commands and demo the tool. For xml2rfc, the tutorial will include a brief introduction to XML for novices and will cover the usage of the 'processing instructions' that are available to control the appearance of the final document. Using xml2rfc relieves draft authors of the need to think about getting the boilerplate and overall format right, and provides citation libraries that reduce the pain of generating references to I-Ds, RFCs, and other document series.
Description: The following videos provide introductions to a number of aspects of IETF history, structure and operations. Much of the material originated in the Newcomers Training presented the Sunday before every IETF meeting. Scott Bradner, who revised and presented this tutorial at the IETF for many years produced these videos for his Harvard University Extension School class CSCI E-45A The Cyber World: Hardware, Software, Networks, Security, and Management. Scott and co-instructor Benoit Gaucherin present this course along with its companion course CSCI E-45B The Cyber World: Governance, Threats, Conflict, Privacy, Identity, and Commerce annually. The Harvard Extension School graciously agreed to close caption the videos and let the IETF make them available for general viewing.
Description: This session offers an introduction to IETF WG roles and processes for current or aspiring WG chairs, document editors and technical leaders.
Last time presented: Dallas, TX at IETF 92 Link to slides:WG Leadership Tutorial
Writing RFCs and I-Ds in markdown and a bit of YAML
Description: Writing I-Ds has traditionally involved some finicky Word templating
or typing up hard-to-use (and read!) XML. Recently, it has become more
popular in a wide range of communities to write text in the
plaintext-like "markdown" format. Tools have emerged in the IETF that
allow writing I-Ds in markdown, automatically converting into the XML
format accepted by the RFC editor (and performing a number of chores in
the process that used to be manual work).
We'll look at what's available and then focus on the
"kramdown" set of tools, which enhances markdown with a bit of
structured YAML for the management of references. We'll also look at
popular workflows that minimize manual work while optimizing
collaboration with co-editors and contributors. Bring a laptop with a
current version of the programming language Ruby (≥ 1.9) -- we'll do
some exercises, and hands-on questions are welcome!
Last time presented: Dallas, TX, USA at IETF 92 Link to slides:Writing RFCs and I-Ds in markdown and a bit of YAML
