At 9:57 PM -0500 2/2/05, Robert Sayre wrote:
Paul Hoffman wrote:
Please do *not* rush out to write a Pace unless it is for something that is *truly* part of the Atom core, and you really believe that it is likely that there will be consensus within a week.
Sorry, this is not a legitimate condition. If someone writes a Pace that points out a critical bug or missing feature in the format, and a significant number of WG participants agree, we should miss our deadline because we no longer have consensus on the *current draft*.
First, let's differentiate "critical bug" from "missing feature".
A critical bug can (should!) be brought to the list at any time, even after IETF Last Call. Until the IESG has signed off on the document, critical bugs are always fair game for discussion. Even after the RFC is issued, critical bugs can (should!) be fixed with new RFCs.
As for "missing features", we have already been presented with literally dozens of missing features that the WG decided were not part of the Atom core. There are probably dozens more. We are explicitly putting those out of scope starting Monday because (a) the list is open-ended, (b) extensions to the core are fairly easy, and (c) the chance that a newly-discovered missing feature is really part of the *core* has been decreasing over the past year.
Clearly, we will make mistakes in this document. There are very few finished protocols that don't have design errors (some of them critical) and/or missing features. If anyone thinks that we need more time to search for those, please propose a fixed date by which you think we will be done. We can then spend really fun time on the list talking about process issues and, if consensus is reached, Tim and I can ask for a charter revision with the new milestones.
--Paul Hoffman, Director --Internet Mail Consortium
