RFC links are broken

[JulianMaurin]

Documentation

Hello 👋
RFC hyperlinks present on https://docs.python.org are broken.

It's impacting the documentation version from 3.5.X to 3.10.X and any link to RFC.

Example:

• https://docs.python.org/3.10/library/urllib.parse.html
• https://docs.python.org/3.5/library/urllib.parse.html
• https://docs.python.org/3.10/library/email.utils.html?highlight=rfc#email.utils.decode_rfc2231

Links are targeting https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfcXXXX.html (redirecting to https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfcXXXX.html.html).

The correct address seems to be https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfcXXXX.html but I notice the usage of https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfcXXXX.html on the python 3.12.X documentation.

Not sure there is not already something about this issue, if it's the case sorry but I was not able to find it.

[hugovk]

The RFC links are built using the Sphinx RFC role, like :rfc:`1808`

Sphinx itself expands these out to the full links.

I see Sphinx updated the RFC base URL in sphinx-doc/sphinx#9858:

-    'rfc_base_url': 'https://tools.ietf.org/html/',`
+    'rfc_base_url': 'https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/',

As mentioned in that PR:

The tools.ietf.org subdomain is being wound down and services are moving to
datatracker.ietf.org. Links to RFC documents using the old subdomain are being
redirected to datatracker; this updates the configured rfc_base_url to
point to the current subdomain.

Discussion: mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/0n-6EXEmkTp3Uv_vj-5Vnm3o0bo

That change was released in Sphinx 4.4.0 (released Jan 2022).

---

main/3.12 and 3.11 are already on sphinx==4.5.0:

• https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/main/Doc/requirements.txt
• https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/3.11/Doc/requirements.txt

But 3.10 is on sphinx==3.4.3:

• https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/3.10/Doc/requirements.txt

And 3.9 and 3.8 are on sphinx==2.4.4:

• https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/3.9/Doc/requirements.txt
• https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/3.8/Doc/requirements.txt

And 3.7 is on Sphinx==2.3.1:

• https://github.com/python/cpython/blob/3.7/Doc/Makefile

[merwok]

Welcoming pull requests that add the RFC base URL setting to our sphinx config!

[JulianMaurin]

Welcoming pull requests that add the RFC base URL setting to our sphinx config!

One my way 🚀

[hugovk]

Ping also @rjsparks (author of the above-mentioned https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/0n-6EXEmkTp3Uv_vj-5Vnm3o0bo/):

It looks like there's a problem with the RFC redirects. For example:

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc123.html

redirects to

https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc123.html.html

Note the double .html.html

If I remove a surplus .html then it works:

https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc123.html

@rjsparks - please could you check the redirects? Thank you!

[JulianMaurin]

Ping also @rjsparks (author of the above-mentioned mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf/0n-6EXEmkTp3Uv_vj-5Vnm3o0bo):

It looks like there's a problem with the RFC redirects. For example:

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc123.html

redirects to

https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc123.html.html

Note the double .html.html

If I remove a surplus .html then it works:

https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc123.html

@rjsparks - please could you check the redirects? Thank you!

It seems that the problem has already been solved. I assume that something has been done about the redirection?
If it's the case, I'm interested about what was the fix, thanks

[rjsparks]

The redirect rule needed tuning.