Re: [IDMEF] IESG Comment section 3.2.4

>>>>> On Thu, 8 Jan 2004, Herve Debar, identified as "Herve" below, wrote:

  Herve> Sections 3.2.4, :

  +> My earlier comment was this: [[ Using XML character references to encode
  +> binary data seems seriously broken to me.  Character references in XML
  +> denote Unicode code points, *not* byte values.  I suggest looking to the
  +> XML encryption work for ways to encode binary data in XML. ]]
  +> Now I haven't a clue what this document is specifiying.  There is a
  +> reference to a BYTE datatype, but no description I can see of how it is
  +> encoded in XML.

  Herve> I think that the comment is right. In fact, this reminds me of one
  Herve> of the issues I posted earlier, adding an encoding field to the
  Herve> additionaldata field to specify encoding. Do we need byte encoding
  Herve> outside of additionaldata ? I would like this question answered before
  Herve> deciding what to do with the BYTE type.

The comment is right... that text is REALLY, REALLY old and has been sort of
superceded by real world approaches.

I believe we may still need some sort of "binary data encoding" mechanism for
people who want to stuff raw packets in there or whatever -- at least, people
seemed to want to do that back in some of the meetings.  I'm certainly willing
to be told I'm wrong and we don't need this.

But if we do, I would suggest we look at some of the other RFCs that encode
such data in XML, and follow the same approach, rather than re-inventing the
wheel.

--Dave