Guidelines for Extending the Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP)
RFC 3735

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Network Working Group                                      S. Hollenbeck
Request for Comments: 3735                                VeriSign, Inc.
Category: Informational                                       March 2004

  Guidelines for Extending the Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP)

Status of this Memo

   This memo provides information for the Internet community.  It does
   not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Distribution of this
   memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004).  All Rights Reserved.

Abstract

   The Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP) is an application layer
   client-server protocol for the provisioning and management of objects
   stored in a shared central repository.  Specified in XML, the
   protocol defines generic object management operations and an
   extensible framework that maps protocol operations to objects.  This
   document presents guidelines for use of EPP's extension mechanisms to
   define new features and object management capabilities.

Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  2
       1.1.  Conventions Used In This Document. . . . . . . . . . .  2
   2.  Principles of Protocol Extension . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
       2.1.  Documenting Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
       2.2.  Identifying Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
             2.2.1.  Standards Track Extensions . . . . . . . . . .  4
             2.2.2.  Other Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  5
       2.3.  Extension Announcement and Selection . . . . . . . . .  5
       2.4.  Protocol-level Extension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
       2.5.  Object-level Extension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
       2.6.  Command-Response Extension . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
       2.7.  Authentication Information Extension . . . . . . . . .  7
   3.  Selecting an Extension Mechanism . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
       3.1.   Mapping and Extension Archives  . . . . . . . . . . .  9
   4.  Internationalization Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . .  9
   5.  IANA Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
   6.  Security Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
   7.  References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
       7.1.  Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

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RFC 3735            Guidelines for Extending the EPP          March 2004

       7.2.  Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   8.  URIs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   9.  Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
   10. Full Copyright Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

1. Introduction

   The Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP, [2]) was originally
   designed to provide a standard Internet domain name registration
   protocol for use between Internet domain name registrars and domain
   name registries.  However, specific design decisions were made to
   ensure that the protocol could also be used in other provisioning
   environments.  Specifically:

   o  Extensibility has been a design goal from the very beginning.  EPP
      is represented in the Extensible Markup Language (XML, [3]), and
      is specified in XML Schema ([4] and [5]) with XML namespaces [6]
      used to identify protocol grammars.

   o  The EPP core protocol specification describes general protocol
      functions, not objects to be managed by the protocol.  Managed
      object definitions, such as the mapping for Internet domain names
      [10] (itself a protocol extension), are loosely coupled to the
      core specification.

   o  A concentrated effort was made to separate required minimum
      protocol functionality from object management operating logic.

   o  Several extension mechanisms were included to allow designers to
      add new features or to customize existing features for different
      operating environments.

   This document describes EPP's extensibility features in detail and
   provides guidelines for their use.  Though written specifically for
   protocol designers considering EPP as the solution to a provisioning
   problem, anyone interested in using XML to represent IETF protocols
   might find these guidelines useful.

   XML is case sensitive.  Unless stated otherwise, XML instances and
   examples provided in this document MUST be interpreted in the
   character case presented to develop a conforming implementation.

1.1.  Conventions Used In This Document

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [1].

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RFC 3735            Guidelines for Extending the EPP          March 2004