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Ask HN: What Is a "Living Standard"?

by bulla on 1/25/24, 8:42 AM with 4 comments

Came across this: [https://whatwg.org/principles] that speaks of a technical standard being "living". It is explained as ""Living Standard" means a single, unified technical specification, published by the WHATWG as a Living Standard." Which makes little sense, i.e. using the term to define itself. Someone also called JSON a living standard. What is this philosophy? All web searches seem futile as they point to "standards of living" related material. So, what makes a standard "living standard"?

  • by raxxorraxor on 1/25/24, 8:59 AM

    The difference to a usual standard is referring to the likelihood of the standard getting changed by feedback from pragmatic applications.

    In contrast to standards that are developed by large committees where iterations tend to be slow and sometimes complicated.

    I believe JSON is often an example for a living standard because it contrasts the numerous XML standards, which are so extensive that no or very few applications implement it to the letter.

    Another example for the attempt to develop living standards are RFCs, where input is desired to adapt a possible future standard.

  • by eimrine on 1/25/24, 8:47 AM

    Why you do not give the more precise link https://whatwg.org/workstream-policy#living-standard ? Afaiu, Theora video codec stopped being a living standard because Google and Mozilla have negotiated to wipe down it from their browsers. You can still watch videos encoded in Theora but not in modern browsers any more.

  • by bhaney on 1/25/24, 9:01 AM

    A living standard is just a standard that's continually maintained and updated, as opposed to frozen or finalized. I've never heard JSON referred to as one.

    And while the phrase "standard of living" existing does make it harder to search for, I don't really believe that you weren't able to look it up yourself with a small bit of effort.