Hi all,
We are moving forward with the early review experiment. For Gen-ART, an
early review will replace the LC review, so a reviewer that is assigned
an early review will perform the early review and the telechat review.
I will be monitoring the dir-coord mailing list and assigning reviews as
necessary.
Check the email below for details.
Thanks!
Jean
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: tail-heavy process and early directorate reviews
Date: Fri, 26 Jul 2013 20:35:03 +0300
From: Jari Arkko <[email protected]>
To: Barry Leiba <[email protected]>, Pete Resnick
<[email protected]>, Stephen Farrell <[email protected]>, Sean
Turner <[email protected]>, joel jaeggli <[email protected]>, Benoit
Claise <[email protected]>, "A. Jean Mahoney" <[email protected]>,
Tero Kivinen <[email protected]>, Claudio Allocchio
<[email protected]>
Ok. So by now you should have seen that you've become a member of the
dir-coord list (we changed the name). We've left TSV and OPS directorate
coordinators out for now.
So here's the plan on how this will work. Please comment.
Internet Drafts sent for approval as RFCs are reviewed by individuals
during the IETF Last Call, the Area Directors, IANA, as well as a number
of volunteers in various directorates and review teams. The reviews from
these teams has gained a significant role in ensuring that the IETF
produces high-quality, understandable and implementable RFCs.
Yet, as discussed in
http://www.ietf.org/blog/2013/05/balancing-the-process/ we have a
general problem that quite a lot of the work around IETF documents
happens at the end of the process. In particular, a number of the
reviews during IETF last call point out issues that end up being raised
by the IESG as comments when deciding for the final approval of the
document. It is of course good that issues are caught, but raising them
earlier would be better. And it would be better if the working groups -
the intended focus point of work on a topic - would get to handle them,
as opposed to raising these issues with the IESG. The IESG discussed
these issues in its May 2013 retreat, and decided to experiment with
three actions designed to move more work to the responsibility of the
working groups:
(1) Perform some reviews that are now happening at IETF Last Call a bit
earlier.
(2) Invite document shepherds on IESG telechats when there's a document
that is likely to require discussion.
(3) When a document has a number of issues, hand over the process back
to the working group, as opposed to the IESG tracking the issues. Among
other things, this will ensure that changes are discussed in an open
working group list and agreed through consensus.
Building quality and cross-area review to the process earlier is of
course a big effort. For the first item above, we are launching an
experiment to make a small change to current directorate review
procedures to learn if we can move reviews a little bit earlier. If
successful, this experiment will enable working groups to deal with
issues before IETF Last Call and IESG review and empower the working
groups to be in charge of the documents throughout their life cycle. We
are also hoping that document quality will improve and number of issues
discussed in the IESG will be lower.
While the number of reviews as such is not changed, some additional
effort and care will however be required from the reviewers, directorate
coordinators/secretaries, the working group chairs, and other
participants. The experiment will show us whether this effort is
reasonable and if there are any unexpected effects. The experiment is
performed on a voluntary basis by each directorate. As early review
requests come in, the directorates can throttle workload by either
processing the requests or reverting to the existing procedures.
Initially, the Gen-ART, Security Directorate, and Applications Area
Directorate are included in this effort. Other directorates may be added
later. The experiment will be reviewed after six months.
Care must be taken to avoid a number of possible drawbacks. There may be
problematic documents that would require much re-review and effort.
Similarly, working groups often perform a number of working group last
calls on a document, and it would be undesirable to engage the reviewer
before the document was really ready to be sent forward. And when
reviewers send comments, it is important that the group listens to the
comments in the right way, like you would for a review from a security
expert or a general networking expert. E-mail practices around sending
and responding to comments have to be carefully managed, as the outside
reviewers are typically not list members.
For the *working group chairs*, you can request a review by sending mail
to [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>, indicating the name
of the document. You can ask for a review as soon as a working group
last call has ended successfully and the document edits are done.
Initially, it would make sense to ask for reviews on documents that you
feel are likely the most stable ones. To avoid congesting the reviewer
resources, ask for this service only for some documents, not as a
wholesale service on every document you submit for publication.
You can ask for the review in parallel with ongoing AD reviews, filling
out the shepherd questionnaire, etc. The hope is that reviews can come
in in the same time frame as other tasks in this stage, and that you can
take the comments into account and revise the document before finally
sending it out for IETF Last Call. Reviews will be sent to you and
potentially the working group mailing list. You may need to forward
comments and/or approve new posters to the list. Discussion on the
mailing list is encouraged, but please try to ensure that the reviewer
is kept on the Cc line, as he or she may not be on the list itself.
Treat the reviews with respect and keep it in mind that outside experts
may have opinions that need to be taken into account, even if the
working group had not considered those aspects before. Mediate and
monitor the discussion actively. Try to keep the reviewer out of e-mail
storms and work out solutions separately and then engage the reviewer again.
For the *directorate coordinators/secretaries*, please monitor the
[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>. If there is a request
for a review, dispatch the task to a reviewer. Managing overload is your
task. Please acknowledge requests and whether you can accommodate them.
Directorates that today review documents twice, at IETF Last Call and
then before entering the IESG telechat should continue this practice by
doing the early review and then the IESG telechat review. Existing
practices such as retaining the same reviewer for checking the same
version is useful. Your review tools and practices may need adjustment
to accommodate reviews happening at different times.
For the *reviewers*, take into account the context. Post your reviews to
the working group chairs, authors, and Cc the working group mailing list
if necessary. If your review team uses a template for these e-mails,
some changes may be necessary in the template for the early review. Some
of those changes have been discussed, e.g., in the Gen-ART list.
For everyone, please collect your experiences so that in six months we
can evaluate how you liked the experience. And thank you for your
participation in this effort!
Jari
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