On 1/23/2012 9:35 AM, Pete Resnick wrote:
This is probably something to be moved to a different list;
glad to pursue it elsewhere, but felt that a direct response to this wg's chair
was appropriate (too).
As I said, this is a different thing than what we have been doing and I will not
be doing so without first consulting with chairs and making sure they can and
will manage the discussion reasonably.
As opposed to having chairs who won't?
That is, while the tone of what you say sounds entirely reasonable, I suspect
it's predicate actually isn't.
Or rather, if there is claimed to be an inability to have reasonable list
discussion, there's a much, much deeper problem. The problem will need
attention, but it isn't really a justification for treating Discusses as
different from other input to the wg.
Right. One alternate means for doing this is moderating discussion. We are
generally loathe to do moderated mailing list postings in the IETF unless things
I believe IETF working groups are never moderated generically. That is, I
believe they never assert control over /all/ messages before being circulated.
Some /individuals/ have messages moderated, but not all messages from everyone,
to the group.
As a consequence, this tool in the arsenal again sounds superficially reasonable
but probably isn't.
The overriding problem with the model, here, is the assumption that the working
group needs to be protected in this specific situation. What's missing is
either the track record or the theory to justify this, other than extremely
broad, vague and unfounded fears, I believe.
Remember, this is a change in behavior for all of us, so we do have to make
these kinds of changes with open eyes.
Transitions need tailoring, yes, but let's be clear about the difference between
the transition issues versus to steady-state, long-term issues.
Further, AD Discusses are now publicly documented.
Right. But the additional worry I have is that responses to it are *not*
publicly documented (i.e., when chairs or editors reply to the AD for
clarifications, potential resolutions, etc.) unless the AD takes the additional
step to update their comments in the tracker.
Isn't it nice how conveniently all of this gets fixed by simply moving the
process to the working group mailing list?
So the step you are objecting to is a matter of convenience, not availability.
And it streamlines the resolution process by eliminating the information
gatekeeping by whoever is mediating between the AD and the working group: It
puts the AD directly in front of the folks whose work is being challenged.
This is dependent on the AD *and* the WG involved. An AD might bring up an issue
that was clearly resolved by a WG many months (years!) ago. Without a bit of
restraint by the WG, a lot of sturm und drong can be generated if folks don't
In other words, unlike for anyone else who re-raises old, settled issues, we
need to be especially protective of ADs?
Again, the nature of the issue, here, isn't new. Old material being re-raised
happens in wgs all the time.
All that's different for a Discuss is giving an AD the authority to block things
and then also believing the AD needs to be privileged out of directly
interacting with the wg about it.
The fear that the wg might get upset should not be a fear. It's a certainty
that it will happen... sometimes.
My response is: yes, that's part of the cost of having an AD fail to do due
diligence before blocking a working group. Everyone else who re-raises old
stuff suffers that cost, why shouldn't ADs? (If an AD wants to get educated
properly before lodging a Discuss, they should do that offline.)
just wait for the chair or cognizant AD to explain, "We are aware of that issue,
discussed it at length in the WG, and resolved it in this way for the following
reasons."
And indeed, that's quite reasonable. But again, it's reasonable /all/ the time,
not just for ADs.
(This, BTW, can happen whenever anyone outside the WG comes in to
participate without the history, but AD DISCUSS ballots generate a lot more
sturm und drong because of how late they happen in the process and how solidly
they can knot things up.)
Why should ADs be protected from it?
So it's a bit more than convenience. It's sometimes
manageability of the WG process. But it's not something that can't be handled.
Your premise is that the sturm und drang makes the wg unmanageable. I'll claim
that it makes for a more honest process because it makes more clear to the AD
that they have overstepped, if they have. Or it makes more clear that the wg
has/had a broken process. Either way, it's a more complete and accurate process.
The majority of the non-DISCUSS comments are dealt with by such minor editorial
changes that opening the discussion up to WG comments will likely inundate the
entire IESG unnecessarily
"The entire IESG"? I don't understand how this suddenly puts the entire IESG
into the main flow of interaction between the AD who is blocking things and
the wg that is being blocked.
Because the current model is that all replies to the DISCUSS messages are Cc'ed
directly to the IESG list.And the IESG often does engage in that DISCUSSion.
Oh. Well, yeah, that probably needs to change, in some way, since yes the
traffic volume on the topic is certain to be higher.
Since it certainly seems like a good idea to make it easy for the rest of the
IESG to be able to observe the process, while also being good to separate the
traffic, I will suggest [email protected][1] or somesuch as a
separate iesg list to which such traffic is sent, in addition to the wg mailing
list.
That permits iesg fold to separate the traffic and handle it distinctly.
In any event, a Discuss is expensive for the wg. Why shouldn't it be expensive
for the ADs lodging them?
Indeed, and it's expensive for the IESG as a whole. However, while simply
increasing the expense for everyone is one approach, it's probably not ideal.
I'm not suggesting it as a goal. But the current model inherently imposes a
large burden on the wg and relatively little on the person creating the block.
Moving the primary venue to be the wg makes the handling of a discuss the same
as handling any other topic -- ADs do not get an exemption -- although the
desire to keep the rest of the iesg in the loop does provide a special wrinkle
(see above.)
Again, I think having all AD comments (DISCUSS or COMMENT) go to the WG list is
the preferred outcome, but it is a cultural change. I want to do it carefully
and deliberately.
+1
d/
[1] I'd have suggested iesg-discuss-discuss, but the IESG already uses the term
"discuss-discuss" for something entirely different.
--
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net
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