Refering to X.500 editions

[Kathy Dally <kdally@mitre.org>]

Hi All!

In RFC 2256 the X.500 reference is to 1996.  Unfortunately, this is not
an official date (see below).  Since 1997 is closer to 1996 than 1993,
the draft replacement for RFC 2256
(<draft-ietf-ldapbis-user-schema-00.txt>) refers to X.500 (1997).  In
fact, RFC 2256 includes some attributes that were introduced in X.520
(1997).  However, other LDAPv3 core RFCs refer to X.500 (1993).

In order to align the replacement RFCs, I propose to cite X.500 (1993)
in the title and references of <draft-ietf-ldapbis-user-schema-01.txt>. 
In addition, X.520 (1997) should be a separate reference in the I-D, to
be referred to when describing the new attributes.

Does this make sense?  Please let me know.

Below is material about the different X.500 editions and their ISO/IEC
9594 twins.  Credit is given to Hoyt Kesterson, ISO/IEC 9594 Editor, for
most of the information.  I hope this will be useful to the WG.

Thanks,
Kathy Dally

----------------

Although the X.500 Recommendations and ISO/IEC 9594 were aligned in the
first edition and identical ever since, the official dates on the
standards are different:
 
	*  X.500 Recs (ITU) date is the date of approval.

	*  ISO/IEC 9594 date is the date of publication.

Since a considerable amount of preparation is done between approval and
publication, the dates of the two standards have been different:

	*  first edition:  X.500 (1988) and ISO/IEC 9594:1990

	*  second edition:  X.500 (1993) and ISO/IEC 9594:1995

	*  third edition:  X.500 (1997) and ISO/IEC 9594:1998

	*  fourth edition, currently being published:  X.500 (2001) and ISO/IEC
9594:2001, 
	   except for X.509 (2000) and ISO/IEC 9594-8:2000

Note that ISO/IEC also uses "edition" to mean the "issue number" of the
part of 9594.  This is the meaning of "Edition" on the face of ISO/IEC
9594 parts.  The key is the DATE.

The first edition (overall) includes these recommendations and standard
parts:
	
	*  X.500 - ISO/IEC 9594-1

	*  X.501 - ISO/IEC 9594-2

	*  X.509 - ISO/IEC 9594-8

	*  X.511 - ISO/IEC 9594-3

	*  X.518 - ISO/IEC 9594-4

	*  X.519 - ISO/IEC 9594-5

	*  X.520 - ISO/IEC 9594-6

	*  X.521 - ISO/IEC 9594-7

The second edition added X.525 - ISO/IEC 9594-9:1995, 1st ed.

The third edition added X.530 - ISO/IEC 9594-10:1998, 1st ed.

The fourth edition does not have any additional recommendations or
parts.