The Jabber protocols have long included a method for discovering version information about the software running at another entity's JID. This method makes use of the 'jabber:iq:version' namespace and has been documented variously in Internet-Drafts and elsewhere. Because this protocol is not required by &rfc2779;, the 'jabber:iq:version' namespace was removed from &xmppim;. This specification fills the void for canonical documentation.

The 'jabber:iq:version' namespace provides a standard way for Jabber entities to exchange information about the software version used by the entities. The information is communicated in a request/response pair using an <iq/> element that contains a <query/> scoped by the 'jabber:iq:version' namespace. The following children of the <query/> are allowed in an IQ result:

• <name/> -- The natural-language name of the software. This element is REQUIRED in a result.
• <version/> -- The specific version of the software. This element is REQUIRED in a result.
• <os/> -- The operating system of the queried entity. This element is OPTIONAL in a result.

The standard error conditions described in &xep0086; apply (e.g., service unavailable if the entity does not support the namespace).

There are no security features or concerns related to this proposal.

This document requires no interaction with &IANA;.

The 'jabber:iq:version' namespace is registered in the protocol namespaces registry maintained by the ®ISTRAR;.