| iip | title | status | type | author | created | updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
IIP Purpose and Guidelines |
Active |
Meta |
David Mihal <[email protected]> |
2022-03-09 |
2022-03-09 |
IIP stands for Indexing Improvement Proposal. An IIP is a design document providing information to the community or describing a standard relating to the indexing of blockchain protocols. The IIP should provide a concise technical specification of the feature and a rationale for the feature. The IIP author is responsible for building consensus within the community and documenting dissenting opinions.
Indexing has become a fundamental component of the web3 stack, with indexers like The Graph powering frontends, data platforms and more. At this time, there is minimal standardization or consensus around design choices that should be made when building indexing platforms, which adds complexity for both developers and data consumers. This repository aims to provide standards upon which these indexers can be built.
IIPs should be written in markdown format.
Image files should be included in a subdirectory of the assets folder for that IIP as follows: assets/iip-N (where N is to be replaced with the IIP number). When linking to an image in the IIP, use relative links such as ../assets/iip-1/image.png.
Each IIP must begin with an RFC 822 style header preamble, preceded and followed by three hyphens (---). This header is also termed "front matter" by Jekyll. The headers must appear in the following order. Headers marked with "*" are optional and are described below. All other headers are required.
iip: (this is determined by the IIP editor)
title:
author: <a list of the author's or authors' name(s) and/or username(s), or name(s) and email(s). Details are below.>
* discussions-to: <a url pointing to the official discussion thread>
status: <Draft | Last Call | Accepted | Active | Abandoned | Rejected | Superseded>
* review-period-end:
type: <Standards Track (Core, Networking, Interface, ERC) | Informational | Meta>
* category: <Core | Networking | Interface | ERC>
created:
* updated:
* requires: <IIP number(s)>
* replaces: <IIP number(s)>
* superseded-by: <IIP number(s)>
Headers that permit lists must separate elements with commas.
Headers requiring dates will always do so in the format of ISO 8601 (yyyy-mm-dd).
The author header optionally lists the names, email addresses or usernames of the authors/owners of the IIP. Those who prefer anonymity may use a username only, or a first name and a username. The format of the author header value must be:
Random J. User <[email protected]> or
Random J. User (@username) if the email address or GitHub username is included, and
Random J. User if the email address is not given.
While an IIP is a draft, a discussions-to header will indicate the mailing list or URL where the IIP is being discussed.
As a single exception, discussions-to cannot point to GitHub pull requests.
The type header specifies the type of IIP: Standards Track, Meta, or Informational.
The created header records the date that the IIP was assigned a number. Both headers should be in yyyy-mm-dd format, e.g. 2001-08-14.
The updated header records the date(s) when the IIP was updated with "substantial" changes. This header is only valid for IIPs of Draft and Active status.
IIPs may have a requires header, indicating the IIP numbers that this IIP depends on.
IIPs may also have a superseded-by header indicating that an IIP has been rendered obsolete by a later document; the value is the number of the IIP that replaces the current document. The newer IIP must have a replaces header containing the number of the IIP that it rendered obsolete.
IIPs may include auxiliary files such as diagrams. Such files must be named IIP-XXXX-Y.ext, where “XXXX” is the IIP number, “Y” is a serial number (starting at 1), and “ext” is replaced by the actual file extension (e.g. “png”).
It occasionally becomes necessary to transfer ownership of IIPs to a new champion. In general, we'd like to retain the original author as a co-author of the transferred IIP, but that's really up to the original author. A good reason to transfer ownership is because the original author no longer has the time or interest in updating it or following through with the IIP process, or has fallen off the face of the 'net (i.e. is unreachable or isn't responding to email). A bad reason to transfer ownership is because you don't agree with the direction of the IIP. We try to build consensus around an IIP, but if that's not possible, you can always submit a competing IIP.
If you are interested in assuming ownership of an IIP, send a message asking to take over, addressed to both the original author and the IIP editor. If the original author doesn't respond to email in a timely manner, the IIP editor will make a unilateral decision (it's not like such decisions can't be reversed :)).
The current IIP editors are
* ligi <[email protected]>
For each new IIP that comes in, an editor does the following:
- Read the IIP to check if it is ready: sound and complete. The ideas must make technical sense, even if they don't seem likely to get to final status.
- The title should accurately describe the content.
- Check the IIP for language (spelling, grammar, sentence structure, etc.), markup (Github flavored Markdown), code style
If the IIP isn't ready, the editor will send it back to the author for revision, with specific instructions.
Once the IIP is ready for the repository, the IIP editor will:
-
Assign an IIP number (generally the PR number or, if preferred by the author, the Issue # if there was discussion in the Issues section of this repository about this IIP)
-
Merge the corresponding pull request
-
Send a message back to the IIP author with the next step.
The editors don't pass judgment on IIPs. We merely do the administrative & editorial part.
This document was derived heavily from Bitcoin's BIP-0001 written by Amir Taaki which in turn was derived from Python's PEP-0001. In many places text was simply copied and modified. Although the PEP-0001 text was written by Barry Warsaw, Jeremy Hylton, and David Goodger, they are not responsible for its use in the Indexing Improvement Process, and should not be bothered with technical questions specific to IIPs. Please direct all comments to the IIP editors.
Copyright and related rights waived via CC0.