Xml2rfc is the tool the IETF uses to convert the canonical XML for an Internet-Draft into text, HTML or a PDF. This utility has seen many releases while the XML schema was being finalized. It’s important (if you write I-Ds) that you have the latest version of xml2rfc installed.

Installing it as a Debian package is done with:

  • go to https://pypi.org/project/xml2rfc/#files
  • download the tar archive (say “xml2rfc-2.35.0.tar.gz”)
  • execute: py2dsc-deb xml2rfc-2.35.0.tar.gz (“py2dsc-deb” can be found in the “python-stdeb” package)
  • execute: sudo dpkg -i deb_dist/python-xml2rfc_2.35.0-1_all.deb

Note a py2dsc also exists, but that doesn’t create a Debian package.

If you don’t want to write I-Ds in XML, take a look at mmark that allows you to use Markdown.