Subject: Call for Consensus: IETF Administrative Restructuring

From: Harald Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 17:36:59 -0400

The IAB and IESG have considered the input and feedback of the IETF community to
date, including discussions on the IETF mailing and the results of the straw
poll conducted in mid-October.  Based on this input, the IAB and IESG have
written a specific recommendation about how to go forward with this work, and
have published it as an Internet-Draft:

- IAB and IESG Recommendation for IETF Administrative Restructuring
   <draft-iab-iesg-adminrest-rec-00.txt>

We believe that the IETF community opinion has converged on a rough consensus
to restructure our administrative support activity as described in this
recommendation ("Scenario O"), and we are sending out this Call for Consensus in
order to verify that such a consensus exists.
Verifying this consensus will allow the IAB and IESG to focus our efforts on
executing the AdminRest transition plan and on refining and completing the IASA
BCP.

Once we have a verified consensus, we will publish the recommendation document
as an Informational RFC for the historical record.

If you disagree with our determination of IETF consensus, or if you have any
other comments on this consensus call or on the document describing the
recommendation, please send them to the IETF mailing list ([email-masked]) by
Monday, November 8, 2004.

NEXT STEPS:

The document that is our working document for the IASA BCP is published as an
internet-draft:

- Structure of the IETF Administrative Support Activity (IASA)
   <draft-wasserman-iasa-bcp-01.txt>

This document is not ready for Last Call, and we expect it to be substantially
revised based on community feedback and discussion.

Our plan for carrying out the restructuring is made public on the AdminRest web
page at <http://www.alvestrand.no/ietf/adminrest/>. One snapshot of it (current
as of this writing) is also a current internet-draft:

- Proposed Transition Plan for IETF Administrative Restructuring
   <draft-wasserman-adminrest-plan-01.txt>

This document will not be published as an RFC.

Harald & Leslie
(for the IESG & IAB)

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From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 11:21:12 +0200

Harald,

I think the consensus you have asserted is indeed the rough
consensus of those who have spoken up.

I would make three observations:

1. We are attempting to change part of the IETF's "social
contract" here. I'm glad to see the IAB and IESG showing
leadership, but it is unusually important to involve the whole
community.

2. I would like to see us stick as closely as possible to the
letter and spirit of RFC 2026, even if we don't have process
rules that cover exactly what we are doing. Specifically,
I'd like to see normal usage of the I-D mechanism for developing
successive versions of the necessary documents. I don't consider
a web site that I have to remember to look at to be a satisfactory
alternative.

3. Some issues were raised in the recent "Shuffle those deck
chairs" and "Sunshine law" threads that are outside the scope
of administrative restructuring, but they deserve attention
in the reasonably near future. But let's keep them separate.

     Brian

Harald Alvestrand wrote:
> IETF-Announce mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf-announce
>

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From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 11:40:39 +0200

Brian,

thanks for your comments!

> leadership, but it is unusually important to involve the whole

It is. That is why we have kept the discussion on the largest relevant list 
we could find, made a consensus call on the direction, and will do Last 
Calls on the final document or documents.

I do sympathize somewhat with the people who just want "someone to take 
care of this" and choose not to comment in detail on the document - we have 
to make sure they know what's going on, but we cannot force anyone to 
actively participate in the process. Like most IETF processes, it becomes 
much easier to participate after reading the documents - but that IS a 
significant investment of time.

> a web site that I have to remember to look at to be a satisfactory

For the documents that are to become RFCs, I most heartily agree.
Keeping the community informed of what we are doing in detail is slightly 
different - this is not developing a document, it's keeping our notebook in 
a public place.

> in the reasonably near future. But let's keep them separate.

Agreed.

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 16:38:13 -0400

> significant investment of time.

Hmm.. put me down as somebody who read through them as in depth as I could
manage at the time, and want to be listed under "Will somebody else please
push things in the direction of Scenario O?".  Unfortunately, I'm even
worse at such things than most IETF'ers, so don't have much more to
contribute on this one.

OK.. At least now i'm not in the silent majority anymore. ;)
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---

From: Leslie Daigle <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 28 Oct 2004 17:53:06 -0400

Just to be clear:

> a web site that I have to remember to look at to be a satisfactory

You & I are in agreement.

WRT the plan document:   it is an open statement of what we (minimally
IAB & IETF Chairs, more generally IAB/IESG) believe is the sequence
of steps necessary to get from "here" to "there" (where "there"
cannot be finalized until there is a BCP document that has been through
public discussion, revision and has been approved).  As such (an
open statement), I don't believe I-D is the appropriate form.

That said, if there are portions that the community needs to
review and approved, they can be pulled out and published as
a regularly updated I-D (and even published as an RFC, if that is
a useful part of our documentation path).

Leslie.

-- 

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Leslie Daigle
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