[urn] Re: URN namespace registration request - Wi-Fi Allianc e

Thank you for the feedback! Wi-Fi Alliance will work with our member experts who defined the yang model and the Data Elements specification to resubmit the registration request.

Thanks,
Peng
--

Peng Yan, Ph.D.
Wireless Technologist
Phone: 1-503-805-4161
Wi-Fi Alliance | http://www.wi-fi.org/


-----Original Message-----
From: Dale R. Worley <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, December 27, 2025 6:32 PM
To: Peng Yan <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [urn] URN namespace registration request - Wi-Fi Alliance

[You don't often get email from [email protected]. Learn why this is important at https://aka.ms/LearnAboutSenderIdentification ]

Peng Yan <[email protected]> writes:
> I am submitting a URN namespace registration request on behalf of
> Wi-Fi Alliance (WFA), an SDO focusing on IEEE 802.11 technologies. The
> required registration information is as follows:

First comments:

>     Namespace Identifier:  wfa (requested of IANA)
>
>     Version:  1
>
>     Date:  2025-12-16
>
>     Registrant:  Wi-Fi Alliance (https://www.wi-fi.org/), a standards
>     development organization.
>     Address: 10900-A Stonelake Boulevard, Suite 195, Austin, Texas 78759 U.S.A.
>     Telephone: +1 512 498-WIFI
>     Designated contact: Peng Yan ([email protected]), 3408 Garrett Dr,
>     Santa Clara, California 95054 U.S.A

As Peter noted, what is most useful is a "role" e-mail address, one that the organization will maintain pointing to the contact person (who will change over time).

>     Purpose:  Industry usage of telemetry - described as a YANG data
>     model - arising from usage of Wi-Fi.

Uh, what?  I'm guessing that you mean that the namespace will contain
one(?) URN which is name of one(?) Yang data model.

>     Syntax:  Example: "urn:wfa:yang:wfa-dataelements". Semantics are
> undefined

1) An example is not a specification.  You're involved in standards work and should know this.

2) If the semantics of a URN are truly undefined, then the URN means nothing.  IIUC from the previous section, you mean for one URN to be the name of a Yang data model... which is its semantics.

>     Assignment:  The "wfa" namespace would be solely managed by Wi-Fi
>     Alliance - commonly abbreviated as WFA.
>
>     Security and Privacy:  No potential issues related to security and privacy.
>
>     Interoperability:  All assignments will be made in pure US-ASCII.

Uh, what?  URNs are composed of "pure US-ASCII", indeed are considerably more restricted than that.

>     Resolution:  Resolution mechanisms are NOT intended.
>
>     Documentation:  Wi-Fi Data Elements specification
>
> (https://www/
> .wi-fi.org%2Ffile%2Fwi-fi-data-elements-specification-package&data=05%
> 7C02%7Cpyan%40wi-fi.org%7Ca604d12ef4c64fdf80e208de45b939f5%7C96d49273b
> a0a4c318313f4392f5cdd3b%7C1%7C0%7C639024859030926939%7CUnknown%7CTWFpb
> GZsb3d8eyJFbXB0eU1hcGkiOnRydWUsIlYiOiIwLjAuMDAwMCIsIlAiOiJXaW4zMiIsIkF
> OIjoiTWFpbCIsIldUIjoyfQ%3D%3D%7C0%7C%7C%7C&sdata=oFTwwjQEVb%2FyUzTUXOU
> lsW1k0B2qsgKVrBq2JAJYhmI%3D&reserved=0)

What is this?  I go to it and get some sort of registration page, not a document.  Is the game that I have to tell you who I am to be able to read the documentation?  That doesn't seem to be forbidden, but it's not really compatible with the Tao of the IETF.

>     Additional Information:  None.
>
>     Revision Information: Not applicable.

I don't want to sound too negative here.  We have a history of registering namespaces to SDOs on the loosest terms -- essentially, the syntax "namespace specific part" is "anything allowed by the general URN syntax" and the purpose is "whatever we decide that we need".  See for example the "cablelabs" registration:
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc6289

Dale

_______________________________________________
urn mailing list -- [email protected]
To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected]