this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2023
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Let's get the AMAs kicked off on Lemmy, shall we.

Almost ten years ago now, I wrote RFC 7168, "Hypertext Coffeepot Control Protocol for Tea Efflux Appliances" which extends HTCPCP to handle tea brewing. Both Coffeepot Control Protocol and the tea-brewing extension are joke Internet Standards, and were released on Apr 1st (1998 and 2014). You may be familiar with HTTP error 418, "I'm a teapot"; this comes from the 1998 standard.

I'm giving a talk on the history of HTTP and HTCPCP at the WeAreDevelopers World Congress in Berlin later this month, and I need an FAQ section; AMA about the Internet and HTTP. Let's try this out!

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[–] iamak@infosec.pub 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

What other such joke standards (by you or others) do you like?

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (4 children)

A little lower down the stack, I always liked the Evil Bit in TCP, a standard which removes all need for firewalls heuristics by requiring malware or packets with evil intent to set the Evil Bit. The receiver can simply drop packets with the Evil Bit set, and thus be entirely safe forever from bad traffic.

At the physical interface layer where data meets real life, I especially enjoy IP over Avian Carrier; that link in particular is to the QoS definition which extends the original spec for carrying packets by carrier pigeon.

[–] LeberechtReinhold@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

With the advances on SDcards, IPoAC is getting better and better.

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[–] perviouslyiner@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Someone tested the evil bit and found a selection of real-world networks that react to its presence

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[–] iamak@infosec.pub 1 points 2 years ago

Wow. Never knew about these :)

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[–] ColdPints@infosec.pub 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

What's the process for submitting RFCs? And how do they pick which joke RFC they'll publish? That's a meeting I'd like to be a fly on the wall of

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

For "real" RFCs that aren't Apr 1st jokes, there's an independent submissions track for the public to write Internet-Drafts and then submit them into the review process.

With the joke RFCs, they get emailed straight to the editor at least two weeks beforehand. I'm not privy to the selection meeting, but I expect it's fun.

[–] Clav64@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

I loved sharing this with my senior who hadn't seen it before, and it gave our small team a Ggod chuckle one afternoon. Thanks for your creation.

With the absence of a crystal ball, but with excellent inner knowledge, what future standards could you see being implemented in the next 10 years for internet?

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

As it turns out, one of the Apr 1st RFCs for this year covers AI Sarcasm Detection, but I can see more serious protocols arising for the transfer of AI model data and/or training procedures in the coming years.

I'd also hope ActivityPub reaches Internet Standard level, though it may fall outside the IETF's scope of operations.

[–] blackstrat@lemmy.fwgx.uk 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

A new RFC for IPv7. It's just IPv4 with an extra octet. Yes or no?

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I don't think the extra address space of IPv6 is the problem holding back its adoption, so "IPv4 with another octet" would likely run into the same issues.

Not that it's a bad idea, it's just an idea that's unlikely to catch on.

[–] bric@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

What would you say is holding IPv6 back?

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

The biggest problem IPv6 has is that IPv4 has been so hugely successful: gargantuan resources have been poured into getting the world connected on IPv4, and the routers/etc deployed in the field (especially in sub-Saharan Africa, south Asia, and other places which got the Internet late) are built around version 4: data paths 32 bits wide, ASICs and firmware developed with 4-byte offsets, and so on.

It's a big effort, and more importantly an expensive effort, to move all that infrastructure over for what the end user perceives as no benefit: their websites load just the same as before.

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[–] christophski@feddit.uk 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

What code should be used if we are expecting something to be a teapot? In this scenario it seems a 4XX is inappropriate because there is no error

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

If you're writing a TEA-compliant client, you'd send the BREW request and expect a 300 Multiple Options back, whereby the server will tell you which teabags are installed. You're correct that there'll be no error, unless all the bag stocks are out server-side.

That'd return 503 Service Unavailable, of course.

[–] 200ok@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Every once and a while I'd just like to see 200 get some love, but no. It's all 404 this, 502 that.

I'm just "OK". It's like being the middle child of response codes.

[–] shiro@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

username checks out

[–] ramplay@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

200 is probably the most common status no? Many successful responses will give 200 in the backend

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[–] foggy@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I've heard that the internet is a series of tubes.

Can you confirm?

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[–] JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I need an ELI5 for this I'm a stupid Gen Z

[–] mmagod@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I need one too and I'm a stupid Gen Y

[–] Flemmy@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

As a late millennial and a programmer, I've got you.

So when you request a web page, before anything else, the server gives you a 3 digit status code.

100s means you asked for metadata

200s mean it went ok

300s means you need to go somewhere else (like for login, or because we moved things around)

400s mean you messed up

500s mean I messed up

So this is in the 400s. Each specific code means something - you've probably seen 404, which means you asked for a page that isn't there. And maybe 405, which means you're not allowed to see this

418 means you asked for coffee, but I'm a teapot

[–] mmagod@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 years ago

I can't say enough how amazing your explanation was. Im not a programmer but I have worked on websites (self taught) and I never knew this. Thank you!

[–] Kaboomi@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I’m actually going to that conference! What’s the title of your talk? I’ll be sure to attend it!

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[–] RustedSwitch@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Is the internet still kept in Big Ben?

[–] elvith@feddit.de 1 points 2 years ago

Yes, unless Jen needs to borrow it for a presentation.

[–] lunaticneko@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 years ago (2 children)

You can unilaterally create another status code. What do you create?

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

I quite like the idea of HTTP 256 Binary Data Follows, which is just 200 OK but you asked for a non-text content type file.

[–] perviouslyiner@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago

Wasn't there a new HTTP action recently proposed for "This is a JSON RPC request that we've convinced ourselves is actually REST and we've been using POST and someone finally pointed out that that was stupid"?

Not a new status code but still vaguely amusing.

[–] z3rOR0ne@lemmy.ml 0 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I just found out about this on Brodie Robertson’s yt channel! I am not a teapot btw!!

[–] Two9A@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Glad to hear it, you should walk around with a HTTP 418 hat so more people know you're not a teapot.

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[–] ndr@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

Haha, same here! I was so proud I knew what the title was referring to before reading the post. Lol

[–] z3rOR0ne@lemmy.ml -1 points 2 years ago

I just found out about this on Brodie Robertson’s yt channel! I am not a teapot btw!!

[–] PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml -2 points 2 years ago

I am interested in writing a real RFC, what kind of mailing list etc should I join in order to make my RFC real?

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