[oclug]standards and protocols

[Rod Giffin]

On Mon, 2003-01-20 at 23:22, Shad Young wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-01-20 at 22:37, Reid Gravelle wrote:
> > Hey Shad,
> > 
> > How about this?  A content standard describes the data that's being transmitted while the protocol is how it's transferred.
> > 
> > Reid.
> > 
> 
> Excellent answer. This of course begs the next question, is HTML a
> protocol or a content standard? XML?

Easy to answer if you're using the above definitions of protocol and
content standard, because neither the HTML spec nor the XML spec define
a transmission protocol.  In fact, an HTML or XML document doesn't ever
have to be transmitted.

I have a glossary of CSC, MIL-SPEC, BS (It means British Standard!!) CFR
and a wack of other standards body definitions that is usually really
helpful in discovering the accepted meaning of terms.  It uses the term
protocol extensively, but does not define it.

But, I think the above definition is missing something.  RFC's for
network protocols (eg RFC 793), for instance devote considerable space
to not only defining how a transmission occurs, but defining the data in
the transmission.  To my mind, a protocol defines both the data, and the
method of communication.  That also seems to fit with the use of the
word protocol in the above glossary, and the "mundane world"
(non-electronic) use of the word protocol.

I think you could say that a content standard is a subset of a protocol
that does not define the method of data transfer.

Rod.