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ANSI X9 version of X.509, and Draft Amendment available on request.
I'm posting the following response to a note from to Neil Burnett to this list
to underscore the fact that I am sympathetic to the concern many have expressed
regarding the general unavailability of ISO/ITU documents in general, and X.509
in particular.
Unfortunately, it isn't within my power to change those standards
organization's practices, though I would if I could.
However, I do have copies of what I believe to be the latest ANSI X9 draft,
which has been harmonized with the latest X.509 V3 version. In addition, I have
what I believe to be the latest version of the Draft Amendment to X.509 V3,
which is still in the final balloting phase.
Versions are available in both Word and PostScript format, and I could also
make available an Adobe Acrobat version (PDF). Unfortunately, because of our
firewalls I can't easily put these up on an FTP server for anonymous access,
but I will e-mail them on request. Be warned, however, that they are in the
100K to 200K range.
Bob
Robert R. Jueneman
GTE Laboratories
40 Sylvan Road
Waltham, MA 02254
Jueneman@gte.com
1-617/466-2820
"The opinions expressed are my own, and may not
reflect the official position of GTE, if any, on this subject."
-----
>Thanks for your contributions to both spki and pkix. I hope you stay
>involved - I find your input valuable, though I sometimes disagree with
>your opinions.
Thanks. And by the way, I learn a lot from others as well. I've even been known
to change my opinion from ttime to time, so keep arguing if you disagree -- you
might be right!
>
>On Feb 27, 11:41, Jueneman@gte.com <Jueneman@gte.com> wrote:
>> I don't want to accuse you or anyone else of not having done their homework,
>> but I get the very strong impression that some people haven't read X.509 V3
in >> detail. (Since it hasn't been officially published in hard copy form yet,
>> that's not totally surprising, but I thought that most of the people on this
>> list would have had access to the V3 spec and the proposed Draft Amendment
>> which lays out additional extensions.)
>
>I am surprised to hear the tone of this comment. I doubt that
>even most readers of pkix have read the x.509 specs. The difficulty,
>time, and expense of acquiring ISO and ITU specs has been a major
>problem and topic of debate for a long time.
On that point I heartily agree with you. It is exasperating. I've thought about
acquiring some of the specs on CD-ROM, but couldn't be sure exactly what
version was what.
The ANSI X9F1 document is somewhat more accessible, and Warwick Ford is trying
hard to keep them synchronized. I have what I believe to be the latest, and
could e-mail it to you in either Word or PostScript format. I could also
convert it to Adobe Acrobat (PDF) if you would prefer. Likewise, I have what I
believe to be the latest version of the Draft Amendment and could e-mail it in
either format. But both of them are 100 to 200K in length, so I wouldn't want
to broadcast them to the world.
>
>I have followed pkix for months and it was clear that access to the
>specs is a critical problem. I once followed this pointer,
>
> ftp://NC-17.MA02.Bull.com/pub/OSIdirectory/Certificates/
>
>and had a very hard time making any sense of what I saw there. Part
>of the problem is the endless obfuscation of terminology so that, as I
>recall, I never knew if I was finding 'comments on comments' or
>'comments on a draft' or the draft itself, etc.
You should make that point directly to Hoyt Kesterson <H_Kesterson@bull.com>,
who is the X.509 chair and X.500 rapportuer, and who maintains that list.
Unfortunately, his hands may be tied because of ISO/ITU policy decisions
regarding publication. Those standards organizations still have the mentality
that only large corporations and PTTs are their customers, and they sell the
standards as a means of funding the secretariat functions. It may not do any
good, but screaming to ANSI, NIST, the US Secretary of State, and your elected
representatives will at least let you vent, and might actually accomplish
something!
>
>If you really want people to read the specs, make them (and the specs
>they refer to!) available on-line in a convenient, well-documented
>and hyperlinked way.
I certainly wish it were within my personal power to do so, but it isn't.
>
>Absent that, there is good reason to avoid specs like x.509.
I believe that the PKIX group is acting responsibly in publishing the X.509
spec within an RFC, and in addition trying to profile the usage of the various
fields (although I disagree with some of the recommendations made to date,
e.g., deprecating the use of certificate suspension.)
>
>Cheers,
>
>Neal.McBurnett@att.com 503-331-5795 Portland/Denver
>Bell Labs Innovations for Lucent Technologies
> Formerly AT&T's systems and technology business
>http://bcn.boulder.co.us/~neal/Home.html (with PGP key)
>
Bob
Robert R. Jueneman
GTE Laboratories
40 Sylvan Road
Waltham, MA 02254
Jueneman@gte.com
1-617/466-2820
"The opinions expressed are my own, and may not
reflect the official position of GTE, if any, on this subject.
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