Subject: Proposed Experiment: More Meeting Time on Friday for IETF 73

From: IETF Chair <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 14:33:22 -0700 (PDT)

The IESG is considering an experiment for IETF 73 in Minneapolis, and
we would like community comments before we proceed.  Face-to-face
meeting time is very precious, especially with about 120 IETF WGs
competing for meeting slots.  Several WGs are not able to get as much
meeting time as they need to progress their work.  As an experiment,
we are considering adding two Friday afternoon one-hour meeting slots.
The proposed Friday schedule would be:

   0900-1130 Morning Session I
   1130-1300 Break
   1300-1400 Afternoon Session I
   1415-1515 Afternoon Session II

Please share your thoughts about this proposed experiment.  The
proposed experiment will be discussed on the IETF Didcussion mail
list ([email-masked]).

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---

From: Robert Sparks <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 16:41:04 -0500

I support conducting this experiment.

RjS

---

From: Paul Hoffman <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 14:58:14 -0700

At 2:33 PM -0700 7/17/08, IETF Chair wrote:
>we would like community comments before we proceed.

Maybe this could be delayed until the spring meeting in San 
Francisco. Many people who will bring their families to Minneapolis 
in the winter will want Friday afternoon to enjoy the city with their 
families, whereas few of them will want to do so on a spring 
afternoon in San Francisco.

Oh, wait...

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:04:36 -0400

Dear Russ;

On Jul 17, 2008, at 5:33 PM, IETF Chair wrote:

> Please share your thoughts about this proposed experiment.

The IRTF RRG has been meeting all day on Friday, so at one level it  
seems to me
that the meeting already is 5 days. This of course has implications  
about session collisions.

Would there be a refreshment break in the afternoon ?

Regards
Marshall

> The
> IETF-Announce mailing list
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---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:15:04 +1200

>    1415-1515 Afternoon Session II

Try it. We've been having periodical email arguments about Friday
afternoon for years; an experiment is the best way to settle it.
But please do *design* the experiment - what are you going to
measure to find out if it's a success or failure?

    Brian

---

From: Tony Hansen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:19:58 -0400

It would be be best if the Fri afternoon slot were filled in early 
rather than as the last slots to be filled in. That way people would 
have more notice that they're being included in the experiment and 
there'd be less of a chance of a rude surprise.

	Tony

---

From: "James M. Polk" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 17:25:04 -0500

At 04:33 PM 7/17/2008, IETF Chair wrote:
>The IESG is considering an experiment for IETF 73 in Minneapolis,
>

I support this schedule

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:35:17 -0400

> measure to find out if it's a success or failure?

I agree strongly with this latter point.  

I've been trying to come up with a measure of success.  So far, I
imagine measuring additional effective sessions[1] and measuring
attendance at meetings on Friday afternoons compared to other
afternoons.  One could also measure success as a different ratio: the
number of complaints about Friday afternoon slots compared to the
number of complaints that there isn't enough time for the needed
meetings.

A

[1] This one opens a can of worms, since we'd have to operationalise
"effective session".

-- 
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From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:42:54 -0700

> measure to find out if it's a success or failure?

+1

For example, exactly what problems are being targeted?

Have sessions been getting turned down due to a lack of slots?  Are they 
really sessions that were needed?

Or is the concern collisions, where having more slots on an added day 
makes it possible to spread things out more?

Or...?

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker
   Brandenburg InternetWorking
   bbiw.net
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---

From: Joel Jaeggli <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:56:43 -0700

In many locations this may preclude departure until saturday which 
effectively makes the meeting longer by a day.

Don't know for a fact that an extra day is bad. But it would make most 
of my iett trips saturday to saturday.

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:01:42 -0400

>Would there be a refreshment break in the afternoon ?

No.  It is just 15 minutes to get between the two one-hour 
sessions.  The proposed extension to the meeting is 2.25 hours.  We 
regularly have 2.5 hour sessions with no refreshments, so I do not 
see the need for additional food and/or beverage expense.

Russ

---

From: "Adrian Farrel" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 00:19:22 +0100

Is there a cost implication for stripping down the network and other 
facilities?

This usually disappears pretty promptly on Friday, presumably allowing it to 
be packed up for shipping and the associated staff/volunteers to travel on 
the Friday.

If we extend into the mid afternoon, do we have to carry additional 
accommodation charges, etc.? This may be an expense worth paying, but it 
should be flagged.

Adrian

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:19:03 -0400

>measure to find out if it's a success or failure?

Fair comment.

There are of course several different dimensions.  One is to see if 
this reduces conflicts.  Another is to see if WGs get all of the time 
that they request.  These are two dimensions that might not be easily 
seen by many participants, and objective measurement is not straightforward.

A question on the survey that is taken after each meeting is planned 
to get comments from all meeting attendees.

Do you have other ideas for measuring the success / failure?

Russ

---

From: Tony Hansen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:30:13 -0400

One measurement would be the number of conflicts that cannot be resolved 
with and without the extra slots.

	Tony Hansen
	[email-masked]

---

From: Olafur Gudmundsson <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:57:39 -0400

>proposed experiment will be discussed on the IETF Didcussion mail

How about addressing the problem by creating 1.5 hour slots?

The Dublin schedule has 117 meetings slots scheduled,
24 are 60 minutes
47 are 120 minutes
8  are 130 minutes
38 are 150 minutes

Number of working groups ask for 2 hour slots because they think
1 hour is not sufficient.

For example by scheduling Monday as 4 x 90 minutes slots instead of the
2 x 120 + 1 x 130 we gain 8 meeting slots.

One observation, some of the 60 minute slots and Friday morning slot
have less than 8 meetings in parallel.
IMHO adding 2 sets of 60 minute slot on Friday will not help.

         Olafur

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 21:48:22 -0400

Dear Russ;

After our discussions on this in San Jose, I spent a little time  
thinking of options for extra meeting time. Here are some more  
considered thoughts, focusing mostly on costs and meeting logistics,  
and intended to engender further discussion. I will be ruthless in  
doing back of the envelope cost estimates in the absence of actual  
ones. A detailed financial statement for IETF-70 (Vancouver) is  
available at

http://iaoc.ietf.org/documents/Vancouver_Financial_Statement_Preliminary.pdf

and I use that for price estimates.

It seems to me that the IETF is bursting at the seams. Certainly both  
the number of interim meetings seems to be increasing (are statistics  
on the number and attendance of interim meetings available anywhere?),  
so it is reasonable to try and find means that will provide more  
meeting slots.

Possible solutions include

1 - Add meetings to Friday (the proposed experiment). We could add 3,  
but the experiment is for 2. If we kept the rest of the meeting the  
same, then the 2 session option would add 16 sessions per meeting, or  
48 per year. If we add 3 sessions, there would be 24 per meeting, or  
72 per year. There would definitely be extra expenses for these  
options :

- Currently, the IETF is torn down starting at 1130 AM on Friday. This  
obviously would not be possible with this option, and there would  
almost certainly be an extra Verilan (Connectivity and NOC) and maybe  
a AMS (Secretariat) expense, which presumably Ray could estimate or  
get quotes for. For Vancouver, Verilan was $ 115,000, so an extra half  
day would be about $ 25,000.

- There would be an extra hotel charge, particularly if the Hotel is  
unable to use our space for Friday evening parties. This might show up  
(especially in the US) and an increased food and beverage cost even if  
we don't provide refreshments, and Ray should see if that is the case  
for Minneapolis. Likewise, there might be $ 5000 in Audio Visual costs.

- Since there are existing Hotel contracts for a number of future  
meetings, these would have to be renegotiated, and it is likely that  
some of these hotels will now be booked for Friday afternoon (or will  
have Friday evening parties that will need the setup time), so this  
option may not be possible for all of our future meetings.

- If the Friday meeting goes late enough that people have to get a  
Friday night hotel room, then both participants and the IETF will have  
a fairly considerable extra expense.

If we just assume that charges are linear with meeting time, this  
option would entail something between $ 35,000 and
$ 48,000 (based on Vancouver), or $ 105,000 to $ 140,000 / year or  
about $ 40 added to the meeting fee.

I would urge Ray to prepare a proper budget with actual quotes for  
this option.

2 - Add evening sessions to the existing meetings, presumably after a  
dinner break. This would add 8 x 4 = 36 slots per meeting, or 108 per  
year. It would probably not cost the IETF much (it is not clear to me  
if Verilan would charge more for the longer hours; the total charge  
for this in Vancouver was $ 115,000; the extra cost would ~ $ 30,000  
($90,000 / year) per meeting assuming a linear charge for the extra  
time. I would expect the actual extra charge to be less; this could be  
determined by Ray while he was doing the estimates for # 1. I know  
that people did not like the meetings after dinner, so this would  
probably be resisted, but it would add more slots and probably at a  
lower price. I don't know if there would be extra hotel charges, but I  
suspect not.

3 - Go from 8 simultaneous sessions to 9. This would add 16 sessions  
per meeting, or 48 per year with the Dublin scheduling. This option  
would of course make collisions worse, and might be limited by AD  
availability. It would also require more hotel rooms, and some  
upcoming hotels might not be able to support it. Basically all of the  
costs (hotel, Verilan, etc.) would increase. Again assuming a linear  
model for costs, the extra cost would be about $ 48,000 per meeting,  
or $ 144,000 per year, or an extra $ 50 or so to the registration fee.

4 - Add a fourth meeting. This would provide ~ 117 slots per year.  
This would actually considerably increase the IETF's revenue _if the  
attendance stays more or less the same_.  As you know, the IETF  
meeting income is used to pay for the other IETF activities. IETF-70  
provided a profit of $769,534, so this solution would probably  
increase the IETF's yearly net income by $ 500,000 or more. I have a  
feeling that many people would resist this, and of course it would  
probably not be possible to schedule a fourth meeting before 2010, if  
then.

5 - Having some sort of structured interim meeting or meetings during  
the year. With 8 Areas, there could be 3 or 4 mini IETF's during the  
year. If these area-interims lasted 2.5 days each, with no  
simultaneous sessions, each might add 8 slots, or say 24 to 32 per  
year. I would assume that these meetings would be run to at least  
recoup costs if not provide additional income for the IETF. These  
meetings, being small, would be fairly easy to book, and probably  
could start more or less immediately.

Note that, while no one might feel that they had to attend every area- 
interim, many might feel that had to attend more than one, so in some  
ways this would cause more travel for attendees than option 4, for  
many fewer additional slots. This option has, however, the great  
advantage that WG could get a lot more focused time to work on issues.

So, here is a table on the options

Option   Slots / year    Rough Cost / Year     Biggest Drawback IMHO

1         48-72          $ 100,000 to 140,000  Staying Friday night
2         108            $  90,000             Staying late at night
3         48             $ 140,000             AD availability,  
collisions
4         117            highly profitable     Extra travel, would  
have to wait till at least 2010
5         24-32          neutral or profit     Extra travel,  
inefficient  for attendees

One danger for some of these options is that there would probably be  
more pressure to structure the meetings so
that not everyone has to come to every day of the meeting, which could  
have unpredictable results.

So, in conclusion, I would

- support the experiment
- request better cost estimates for the experiment
- suggest that in the actual operations the experiment would need to  
be expanded to give most WG even one extra meeting per year
- suggest that combinations of options 1,2,3 and 5 will need to be  
explored unless we are willing to move to option 4.

I hope you find this reasoning useful.

Regards
Marshall

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 13:51:50 +1200

Olafur,

If you recall the Paris meeting, we did try a different mixture
of session lengths, and it caused quite some scheduling problems.
I'd have to dig out some old email for the details, but it
was definitely a problem. So after Paris, we stuck to the late
dinner schedule, but went back to a more traditional mixture of
session lenghths.

I certainly wouldn't recommend mixing two experimental changes,
after that experience.

    Brian

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 22:27:08 -0400

--On Thursday, 17 July, 2008 18:19 -0400 Tony Hansen
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> It would be be best if the Fri afternoon slot were filled in
> early rather than as the last slots to be filled in. That way
> people would have more notice that they're being included in
> the experiment and there'd be less of a chance of a rude
> surprise.

Russ,

I agree with Tony.  It is perhaps worth mentioning that we've
tried versions of this before (and done so without clear
evaluation criteria -- Brian is right about that).  The mistake
in the past was that the scheduling algorithms have sent a clear
message that there will be few IETF sessions on Friday and that
most of them will be unimportant.

There are also two rather different experiments that you could
carry out here.  I'd favor the second, but you should at least
be clear about what you intend.

Experiment 1: The Friday afternoon slots are just slots, like
any other slots, and the Secretariat tries to distribute WGs
across the entire week including those slots.

Experiment 2: You treat the Friday slots mostly as an overflow
area, using scheduling rules like:

	* If you ask for three slots (and the relevant signoff
	process occurs), you are almost guaranteed a Friday slot
	and might get two or three.
	
	* If you ask for two slots, the odds of at least one of
	them being allocated on Friday are very high.

That would make things fairly predictable, and would work from a
scheduling standpoint unless several of the "we need multiple
slots" WGs have overlapping membership.   It would also probably
work out without disrupting the various groups that may be
meeting on Friday now (an IRTF group has been mentioned and, if
I recall, ISOC sometimes uses Friday time) in that missing one
session of a two-slot (or more) WG is typically much less bad
than missing the single session of a one-slot WG.

But the two models are very different and any experiments would
find themselves testing different things.

One other observation:  To the extent that the reason for doing
this is, as indicated in your note, "...Several WGs are not able
to get as much meeting time as they need to progress their
work...", I would encourage the IESG to very carefully evaluate
what is actually going on above and beyond whether having more
of Friday available would help with scheduling.  For example,
have these WGs shifted from getting most of their work done on
mailing lists to doing almost everything in meetings and, if so,
is that a problem that needs fixing?  If mailing lists are being
used adequately, do the WGs have a task management problem
(e.g., trying to work on too many things)?  Are they conducting
meetings efficiently and using the time well?  And so on.
Basically, if we believe in our claims that most work gets done
on mailing lists, if a WG routinely requires most than one slot
and especially if they require more than two, I would wonder
more about what isn't working and how to fix it than I would
about allocating more meeting time.

best,
   john

---

From: Bill Manning <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 20:13:26 -0700

what is interesting to me is the weekend factor.
for nearly a decade, I've been going to mtgs the
wkend before the start of IETF - workshops, training sessions,
sidebars, RSSAC mtgs, etc.

about five years ago, the -other- suite of interesting/useful
meetings  started occuring the weekend -after- the
IETF was finished - more workshops, training sessions,
interop testing, OARC meetings, IRTF etc.

IETF working group meetings, per se, during the week
became less interesting, since actual work occured
the weekend before and the weekend after.

YMMV of course.

-- 
--bill

Opinions expressed may not even be mine by the time you read them, and
certainly don't reflect those of any other entity (legal or otherwise).

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:41:15 +0200

Maybe it's just me, but...

I oppose this experiment.  I already donate to my employer a significant 
amount of travel time on weekends without wanting to add to it.  Flight 
schedules are tightening, thanks to the cost of fuel, which means that 
having sessions on Friday at all poses a problem now, if I want to get 
back by Saturday.  Having afternoon sessions would put a nail in that 
coffin.

I propose two alternative experiments:

1.  Required agendas and Approval

No session can be approved without a posted agenda.  Many agendas are 
late, which makes it difficult for people to know where they have to be 
and when.  This is particularly true of working groups that meet more 
than once.  The dhc chairs in particular have done a really good job of 
providing the working group with an opportunity to comment on the agenda 
prior to upload.  Approval of agenda by either WG or AD (I could make 
arguments for both) would also limit stupid stuff.  Just because I've 
written a draft doesn't make it intersting to anyone else.

2.  More meeting rooms per venue.

While this one adds expense in  one way it can reduce in hotel and food 
costs to counterbalance.  The real downside is that people will have to 
be pickier as to which meetings they attend.

In addition, I'd argue that we need to update our rules to allow for 
less notice so that more use of teleconferencing can take place.  I 
recognize that this solution is not a panacea, especially for the poor 
shmo who has to be up at 4:00am to participate.

Eliot

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:52:23 +0100

> I oppose this experiment.  I already donate to my employer a 
> significant amount of travel time on weekends without wanting 
> to add to it.  Flight schedules are tightening, thanks to the 
> cost of fuel, which means that having sessions on Friday at 
> all poses a problem now, if I want to get back by Saturday.  
> Having afternoon sessions would put a nail in that coffin.

One wonders why the IETF is so reluctant to make more use
of an interesting service called the Internet. I hear that
it offers cheap conference calls, and cheap video conferencing
capabilities. One would think that in this age of rising
fuel/transportation costs, the IETF would be looking to
make heavier use of telecommunications to reduce the amount
of face-time required.

> In addition, I'd argue that we need to update our rules to 
> allow for less notice so that more use of teleconferencing 
> can take place.  I recognize that this solution is not a 
> panacea, especially for the poor shmo who has to be up at 
> 4:00am to participate.

That poor schmo should be happy that he has saved himself
the aggravation of a week of jet lag. Also, video or voice
conferences can be recorded so that people who have real problems
with time differences, can still follow the work, and join
in at other venues such as mailing lists, or the next conference
call which is scheduled at a different time.

--Michael Dillon

---

From: Eric Rosen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:49:13 -0400

I oppose this experiment.

A better experiment would be to eliminate the Friday morning sessions.

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:20:14 -0400

Dear Elliot;

On Jul 18, 2008, at 5:41 AM, Eliot Lear wrote:

> significant amount of travel time on weekends without wanting to add  
> to it.  Flight schedules are tightening, thanks to the cost of fuel,  
> which means that having sessions on Friday at all poses a problem  
> now, if I want to get back by Saturday.  Having afternoon sessions  
> would put a nail in that coffin.
>
> No session can be approved without a posted agenda.  Many agendas  
> are late, which makes it difficult for people to know where they  
> have to be and when.  This is particularly true of working groups  
> that meet more than once.  The dhc chairs in particular have done a  
> really good job of providing the working group with an opportunity  
> to comment on the agenda prior to upload.  Approval of agenda by  
> either WG or AD (I could make arguments for both) would also limit  
> stupid stuff.  Just because I've written a draft doesn't make it  
> intersting to anyone else.
>
> While this one adds expense in  one way it can reduce in hotel and  
> food costs to counterbalance.  The real downside is that people will  
> have to be pickier as to which meetings they attend.
>
> less notice so that more use of teleconferencing can take place.

It may just be too little coffee, but I am not sure what you meant  
here. What rule prevents teleconferencing ?

On a related note, I think that it would be valuable to have video of  
each meeting, as long as it could be done at a reasonable cost. A  
fixed camera aimed at the chair's table, plus a fixed view of the  
presentation, should not cost that much (roughly, 16
cameras would maybe cost $ 4 K, plus whatever setup and teardown time  
required).

Marshall

>  I recognize that this solution is not a panacea, especially for the  
> poor shmo who has to be up at 4:00am to participate.
>
> Eliot

---

From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:50:37 -0400

one thing to measure is how many WG or BOF chairs say "Please don't give 
us a Friday afternoon session".

---

From: Eric Rescorla <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 07:20:37 -0700

At Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:41:15 +0200,
> back by Saturday.  Having afternoon sessions would put a nail in that 

I haven't decided whether I agree with Eliot entirely, but I think
he raises some good points here. I would add two more:

1. I've attended IETFs where there was a meeting on Friday all day
(e.g., the P2PSIP Ad Hoc at IETF 64) and it seemed to me that people
were pretty wiped at that point, so even though they felt that
they had to show up, I'm not sure much got done.

2. People's ability to meet tends to expand to fill out the available
meeting time. 

With these two points in mind, It would be nice to have some metric of
success that's more than just people showing up to the
meetings. Unfortunately, I don't have such a metric. :(

> and when.

I completely agree with this. Before each IETF I attend I use automated
tools (http://tools.ietf.org/tools/getdrafts/)
to suck down each draft on the agenda and I regularly find 
a large fraction of WGs with missing agendas. As of today, the following
WGs have no agenda:

  softwire, v6ops, mip4, dime, l3vpn, idnabis, l2vpn, ntp, savi, rtgwg,
  ecrit, capwap, radext, opsawg, rtgarea, pkix, opsec, isis, keyprov,
  vcarddav, netmod, pce, saag, grow, autoconf

It's also not just an issue of knowing where to be and when but of
getting prepared. It helps to know in advance which drafts you need
to read.

-Ekr

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 07:44:57 -0700

John's questions, here, go to the basic challenge we constantly face
when there are demands for more resources:  Are they really needed, and
if they are, why? If they are not needed, is there a deeper problem that 
needs to be addressed?

 From external observation, the IETF deals with the issues in an
open-loop manner.  While I've no doubt that individuals on the IESG have
criteria they apply, we do not get to see an underlying basis for
consuming more resources, other than that they've been asked for.  Seen
from the outside, it does appear that deeper consideration could be
quite helpful.

When a working group asks for time, there is already some evaluation of 
whether the request is appropriate.  Today, that evaluation is pretty 
subjective and internal.  Consider making the evaluation, itself, part 
of the feedback a wg ought to get about how well or poorly it is doing.

Simple thought:  Imagine having a running tally, for each working group,
that assessed its current status on a 5 point scale, such as:

   +2:  Stellar

   +1:  Very good shape

    0:  On target

   -1:  Behind the curve

   -2:  In very serious trouble

With some rather simple process for determining this, such as progress
according to schedule -- because, after all, milestones are plentiful
and kept up to date, right? -- rate of opening and closing Issues, tone
of mailing list discussion, and rate of I-D generation and improvement,
or somesuch.

Meeting requests should not only include an agenda but a statement of 
intended progress.  What outputs are expected from the meeting and why 
is it reasonable to expect that they will happen?

John's point about mailing list vs. meeting time is fundamental. The
IETF model has always been to have primary work done on the list.  If
that has changed, we need to consider the change carefully.  For
example, meeting time is not inclusive.  Only the privileged few with
funding and job time can attend.  (Meeting time also cannot be
sufficient for any serious work, even with an extra day.)

d/

John C Klensin wrote:
> is that a problem that needs fixing?  

-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 17:53:24 +0300

Joel,

> effectively makes the meeting longer by a day.
Hmm. The likelihood of having to depart the next day increases, but the 
question is by how much. For the record, my flights out of Minneapolis 
leave 15:20, 17:30, or 19:15. There does not seem to be any morning 
flights (focus on either morning or evening seems typical for 
intercontinental connections except at the largest hubs). With the new 
schedule I would certainly miss the first one, but would still be able 
to use at last one, maybe both of the other ones. The end result is 
arriving home at noon vs. afternoon the next day.

For local flights, what would be the effect? I don't have a lot of 
experience with US local flights... maybe you can fill me in? To look at 
this, I entered a few major cities on both coasts into my flight booking 
tool, and it showed flights from Minneapolis leaving throughout the day. 
For west coast, the last flights seemed to leave about 10 PM or so, for 
east coast sometime after 6 PM. You could still make a 6 PM flight even 
if the meeting ends at 3:15 PM.

Anyway, my conclusion from this very unscientific study is that while 
having a longer Friday certainly means arriving home hours later, it 
would still seem to be possible for at least some people to go back the 
same day.

But are there other factors at play? Need to arrive home sooner? Too 
tired on Fridays? Would have to carry luggage around if the hotel 
checkout time cannot be extended? Rules or preferences about airline 
selection affect availability of flights? Week is already long enough?

Jari

P.S. I generally do not leave until Saturday anyway, mostly because I 
often have private meetings after the sessions. And RRG meets until 5pm 
Friday in any case. And I would be too tired to pack and fly on Friday.

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 16:57:03 +0200

Jari Arkko wrote:
> Hmm. The likelihood of having to depart the next day increases, but 
> the question is by how much. For the record, my flights out of 
> Minneapolis leave 15:20, 17:30, or 19:15. 

This assumes that you do not need to change planes again within the 
United States something that is not true for some of us.  And it may not 
be true for you by November, depending on which airlines slash which 
flights.

Eliot

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:27:01 -0400

Olafur:

I try to gather some data to see if this would help.  My intuition is 
that we need 2.5+ hours for some very significant working groups so 
these groups would end up with multiple adjacent slots.  But, maybe 
the smaller slots would help with the things that they are scheduled against.

Russ

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:40:27 -0400

Marshall:

I do not know of any repository for the attendance at interim 
meetings other that the proceedings.  Interim meeting minutes are 
included with the proceedings of the following IETF meeting.

The reason that the experiment is scoped as proposed deals with the 
contract that is already signed for Minneapolis.  We need to be out 
by 5:00, so ending at 3:15 is still a put to get the network pulled out.

As you know, we used to have a dinner break and then evening 
sessions.  We changed at the Paris IETF to late afternoon sessions 
followed by a later dinner.  People greatly preferred this 
schedule.  Dinner did not need to be rushed.  After dinner slots were 
considered undesirable, but the just before dinner slots do not have 
this same stigma.

Each of the other suggestions you raise have been discussed by one 
leadership group or another.  Mostly in he IAOC and the IESG.  Each 
have their own pros and cons.  If we experiment with too many of them 
at the same time, then we run the danger of not being able to 
determine which change caused benefit or harm.

Russ

At 09:48 PM 7/17/2008, Marshall Eubanks wrote:
>Note that, while no one might feel that they had to attend every 
>area- interim, many might feel that had to attend more than one, so in some

---

From: Cyrus Daboo <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:38:53 -0400

Hi Eliot,

+1

> be pickier as to which meetings they attend.

I have a third option, which will probably be controversial:

3. Do away with the social on Tuesday night and instead have more sessions 
at that time rather than later on Friday.

-- 
Cyrus Daboo

---

From: "Mary Barnes" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:42:02 -0500

My response is likely redundant with that of other RAI folks, but I have
a feeling that RAI likely has the highest requirement for additional
meeting slots. And, for us RAI folks, The Friday sessions have never
been considered the least important. Indeed, when both SIP and SIPPING
required 2 sessions each, we were alternating the Friday session for
those groups. 

In my mind, these additional Friday sessions are really a must for RAI,
as in the past, we've held adhoc meetings for key topics on these
afternoons and many of us are already in the habit of extending our
stays to include the Friday nite to account for these meetings.  And,
for many folks that have difficulty in getting travel approval for
interim meetings (this issue is getting to be more and more common in my
experience), the additional sessions during IETF week could be really
helpful. 

Regards,
Mary Barnes

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked]
[mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of IETF Chair
Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2008 4:33 PM
To: IETF Announcement list
Cc: [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: Proposed Experiment: More Meeting Time on Friday for IETF 73

The IESG is considering an experiment for IETF 73 in Minneapolis, and we
would like community comments before we proceed.  Face-to-face meeting
time is very precious, especially with about 120 IETF WGs competing for
meeting slots.  Several WGs are not able to get as much meeting time as
they need to progress their work.  As an experiment, we are considering
adding two Friday afternoon one-hour meeting slots.
The proposed Friday schedule would be:

Please share your thoughts about this proposed experiment.  The proposed
experiment will be discussed on the IETF Didcussion mail list
([email-masked]).

---

From: Cyrus Daboo <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:50:11 -0400

Hi,

> 2. People's ability to meet tends to expand to fill out the available

I think this is a key point. Rather than expanding the number of slots why 
don't we look at using the time we have more efficiently. Some questions to 
ask include:

How much work at a meeting could actually have been done on the mailing 
list beforehand?

What work do we do at a meeting that can't be easily done via a mailing 
list?

Do we spend too much time with overviews of drafts that really should have 
been read by all attendees beforehand? Maybe it would be good for the first 
session on Monday to be an "Area Overview" session where an overview of all 
the latest drafts can be "presented" to give people a broader view of what 
is going on? Actually I have often felt that the IESG plenary would be a 
good place for area directors to give status updates/overviews of the work 
going on in their areas.

Are 2 1/2 hour sessions really valuable, or would two shorter sessions be 
better?

-- 
Cyrus Daboo

---

From: Andy Bierman <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 07:56:45 -0700

>> Maybe it's just me, but...

(Fanning the flames...)

I do not understood why WGs are forbidden from conducting
interim or other official extended technical f2f meetings
before, during, or after, an IETF meeting.

Consider the possibility that some participants are focusing
on the charter of 1 or 2 WGs, and perhaps even writing code (!)
in addition to I-Ds.  These people are not too tired from
attending 17 status meetings all week.  These people do not want
to devote an entire week to a few meetings.

The time and cost involved in getting all/most of the principal
technical contributors in the same building for a few days far out-weighs
any fatigue factor cost.

I don't think the IETF meeting fee should cover WG interim meetings,
and I am not convinced there is a big demand for Friday afternoon
WG slots, but if there is a meeting slot shortage, then adding to Friday
is probably the easiest solution.

> getting prepared. It helps to know in advance which drafts you need

Andy

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 17:59:15 +0200

Marshall,
> here. What rule prevents teleconferencing ?

Let's hope it's not too little coffee, and that I am in fact mistaken, 
but I never said that we have rules that *prevent* teleconferencing.  To 
elaborate, my understanding is that the rules for teleconferencing are 
governed by the rules for interim meetings, which require something like 
one month's advance notice plus attendance requirements at the previous 
IETF, and a minimum period of time between meetings.  I regret I can't 
locate the citation right now.  I also think AD approval is required.  
And the reason I think all of these things is that we came close to 
having an appeal on the matter in one of the groups in which I am active.

What I would suggest is that f2f requirement be eliminated, that the 
notice periods be reduced to two weeks, and that AD approval not be 
required.

Eliot

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:02:26 -0700

> In my mind, these additional Friday sessions are really a must for RAI,

What work do RAI groups need to perform during these meetings that 
cannot be done on the various RAI mailing lists?

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:04:36 -0700

+2:  Stellar

   +1:  Very good shape

    0:  On target

   -1:  Behind the curve

d/

-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:14:46 -0500

> locate the citation right now.  I also think AD approval is required.  And 
> the reason I think all of these things is that we came close to having an 
> appeal on the matter in one of the groups in which I am active.

Well, for what it's worth, I believe the operative IESG statement is still 
http://www.ietf.org/IESG/STATEMENTS/Interim-meetings.txt, which (I note) 
hasn't been updated since 2000, and I'm reading it the way Eliot is reading 
it.

Quoting from the statement...

To summarize:
- WG Interim meetings and Conference Calls need approval
  of relevant ADs
- They must be announced at least 30 days in advance
- Text of announcement must be sent to [email-masked]
- The proposed agenda must be published at least 15 days before meeting
- They cannot be held within 30 days prior to an IETF meeting

> notice periods be reduced to two weeks, and that AD approval not be 

Backing up slightly, it might be nice to consider whether we DO want to 
revisit the guidelines for teleconferences.

IMO, since we see author/editor/review/design team teleconferences in a fair 
number of working groups, and these teleconferences aren't covered by the 
rules, I'd be in favor of revisiting the rules...

Thanks,

Spencer

Thanks,

Spencer

---

From: "Mary Barnes" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:29:23 -0500

Dave,

There are a few topics for which mailing list discussion has failed to
reach consensus and would really benefit from f2f time. You can look at
SIP WG archives for example for a couple of the hot topics.  As chairs,
we do try to push for completion of work on the mailing lists, but this
isn't always successful  and we've yet to get around the situation
whereby the vast majority of documents are not updated until just prior
to the meetings, thus the ability to reach consensus and close off
issues is really limited - I can give lots of examples of this, as I
track document due dates for the WG I co-chair and the majority don't
make the dates set for between meeting updates. 

The other issue is just the sheer volume of work incoming to RAI - it's
over 20% of overall IETF drafts per Jari's stats:
http://www.arkko.com/tools/stats/areadistr.html

Also, note that 6 of the RAI WGs make up 50% of the top 12 WGs based on
volume of documents:
http://www.arkko.com/tools/stats/wgdistr.html

We also have more WGs in RAI, thus it's extremely difficult to avoid
overlaps that don't result in concerns for primary contributors.

Mary. 

-----Original Message-----
From: Dave Crocker [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Friday, July 18, 2008 11:02 AM
To: Barnes, Mary (RICH2:AR00)
Cc: IETF Chair; IETF Announcement list; [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: Re: Proposed Experiment: More Meeting Time on Friday for IETF
73

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: Iljitsch van Beijnum <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 18:39:53 +0200

> http://www.arkko.com/tools/stats/areadistr.html

What is a RAI?

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:58:20 -0700

Mary Barnes wrote:
> Dave,
> 
> There are a few topics for which mailing list discussion has failed
> to reach consensus and would really benefit from f2f time. You can
> look at SIP WG archives for example for a couple of the hot topics.
> As chairs, we do try to push for completion of work on the mailing
> lists, but this isn't always successful  ...
...
> The other issue is just the sheer volume of work incoming to RAI -
> it's over 20% of overall IETF drafts per Jari's stats: 

Mary,

Thanks for the quick response.  From my perspective, your opening words, 
above, do suggest exactly the right underlying process and the right 
role for f2f meeting time.

 From what you posted before, however, it sounds as if there is a chronic
lack of meeting time.  This means either that "too many" items can't be
solved on the list -- that is, that there is something about mailing
list exchanges that isn't working well enough.

Another possibility is what's suggested by your later text: there are too
many things being attempted.  In other words, perhaps RAI is trying to
do too much too quickly?  (I mean that as an honest question; I don't
really have an opinion of my own. ) RAI is certainly a broad area, but
it's hard to miss that even RAI folk take note of the massive workload.
  Hence sipping, as a filter on proposals.

An industry can only absorb just so much out of standards arena.  Is it
really absorbing (implementing, deploying, using) RAI output fast enough
to justify the current workload?

> Also, note that 6 of the RAI WGs make up 50% of the top 12 WGs based
> on volume of documents: http://www.arkko.com/tools/stats/wgdistr.html

It's pretty easy to have lots of documents get generated.  What is 
difficult is building real energy (support and effort) to pursue them, 
adopt them, and use them.  Hence my question about industry uptake.

d/

---

From: "Mary Barnes" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:15:29 -0500

Real-time Applications and Infrastructure - home of all the SIP related
stuff that was born in TSV.

Mary. 

-----Original Message-----
From: Iljitsch van Beijnum [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Friday, July 18, 2008 11:40 AM
To: Barnes, Mary (RICH2:AR00)
Cc: [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: Re: Proposed Experiment: More Meeting Time on Friday for IETF
73

What is a RAI?

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 20:20:54 +0300

Spencer,

> IMO, since we see author/editor/review/design team teleconferences in 
> a fair number of working groups, and these teleconferences aren't 
> covered by the rules, I'd be in favor of revisiting the rules...

Lets be clear about the different types of calls people might have. A 
design team meeting is still just a private meeting. We can have any 
number of those without anyone's approval. A meeting to progress a draft 
among authors, for instance. A meeting between interested parties to 
talk about a potential new draft. Authors talking with reviewers about 
an issue. Even if the chairs or ADs would supervise such meetings it 
would still be OK. And this happens a lot in many groups and for many 
drafts.

The rules relate to bigger meetings for the entire WG.

In any case, for what it is worth I am I also in favor of relaxing the 
rules for the WG teleconferences. One week's advance notice seems more 
suitable for teleconference than a month.

Jari

---

From: "Mary Barnes" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 13:09:54 -0500

Dave,

You have lots of good and valid questions below.  I'll respond below and
also cc RAI area mailing list. We have discussed this topic recently, in
particular with regards to concerns over scheduling for IETF-72.  One
concern that the RAI area has, as well is some overlap and dependencies
on TSV area work that also makes our scheduling even more difficult and
contentious.

Thanks,
Mary. 

-----Original Message-----
From: Dave Crocker [mailto:[email-masked]] 
Sent: Friday, July 18, 2008 11:58 AM
To: Barnes, Mary (RICH2:AR00)
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: Proposed Experiment: More Meeting Time on Friday for IETF
73

> reach consensus and would really benefit from f2f time. You can look 
> at SIP WG archives for example for a couple of the hot topics.
...

Mary,

 From what you posted before, however, it sounds as if there is a
chronic lack of meeting time.  This means either that "too many" items
can't be solved on the list -- that is, that there is something about
mailing list exchanges that isn't working well enough.

Another possibility is what's suggested by your later text: there are
too many things being attempted.  In other words, perhaps RAI is trying
to do too much too quickly?  (I mean that as an honest question; I don't
really have an opinion of my own. ) RAI is certainly a broad area, but
it's hard to miss that even RAI folk take note of the massive workload.
  Hence sipping, as a filter on proposals.
[MB] I don't know if I would use the adverb "quickly" for RAI work. And,
it's not too easy to figure out the "Whys?". Here's my first pass at
what I see as some of the whys:
1) Lots of requirements that come in from other SDOs. 
2) Lots of potential for building on what's already been done in RAI
3) A broad range of interested parties (some overlap with 1, but less
than one would think): researchers, vendors and service providers (some
of whom have conflicting objectives, architectural views and
philosophies)
[/MB]

An industry can only absorb just so much out of standards arena.  Is it
really absorbing (implementing, deploying, using) RAI output fast enough
to justify the current workload?
[MB] If we look at SIPit reports, I think the answer here is no at this
point. However, my view is that a lot of folks have done the bread and
butter for the core protocol (which as for any protocol this complex can
take a while to work out bugs). And, there are a lot of folks working on
adding some of the additional functionality albeit different bits based
on the "whys" above.
The area (in particular SIP WG) has attempted to highlight and suggest
the basics that should be implemented:
http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-sip-hitchhikers-guide-05
I do feel that in a couple of years, we may well be in a far different
situation in terms of the amount of industry uptake and the current
situation may just be a natural part of the process for a maturing
protocol/industry. 

In one sense there have been some improvements. SIPPING has completed a
lot of work items (and may be the reason SIP is so overloaded right
now). In addition, RAI has created more focused/tightly chartered WGs to
work on some of the key items such as Emergency Services and Service
Interworking, both of which will be important for the industry uptake.  

So, we have been trying to solve the problems in the area, but some
solutions do create other problems (i.e., more WGs is one of the key
contributors to the scheduling issue). 
[/MB]

It's pretty easy to have lots of documents get generated.  What is
difficult is building real energy (support and effort) to pursue them,
adopt them, and use them.  Hence my question about industry uptake.
[MB] IMHO, we have had some energy issues in various WGs. Part of the
issue is that it is often the same people involved across the board.
Again, Jari has good stats on that in terms of number of docs/author and
range of WGs - RAI folks on the top of the list again. So, I don't know
that IETF can solve this one given the voluntary nature of the job and
the current industry/day job pressures on many of the key contributors.
[/MB] 

d/

---

From: "Spencer Dawkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 13:15:14 -0500

Hi, Jari,

No disagreement here.

Good to give people a heads-up, but to use the same notification periods for 
conference calls and face-to-face interims (which is the way I read the 
current (right?) rules) is excessive.

Thanks,

Spencer

> Spencer,
>
>> IMO, since we see author/editor/review/design team teleconferences in a 
>> fair number of working groups, and these teleconferences aren't covered 
>> by the rules, I'd be in favor of revisiting the rules...
>
> among authors, for instance. A meeting between interested parties to talk 
> about a potential new draft. Authors talking with reviewers about an 
> issue. Even if the chairs or ADs would supervise such meetings it would 
> still be OK. And this happens a lot in many groups and for many drafts.
>

---

From: Keith Moore <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:28:26 -0400

> Do we spend too much time with overviews of drafts that really should 
> have been read by all attendees beforehand? Maybe it would be good for 
> the first session on Monday to be an "Area Overview" session where an 
> overview of all the latest drafts can be "presented" to give people a 
> broader view of what is going on? Actually I have often felt that the 
> IESG plenary would be a good place for area directors to give status 
> updates/overviews of the work going on in their areas.

On reading this I found myself wondering if the "real" IETF WG meetings 
  - these consisting of actual discussions - should be Tuesday-Friday. 
Then Mondays could be used to conduct "presentation" or "introductory" 
or "catch up"  sessions for each of the WGs.  Attendees who hadn't read 
the documents and kept up with the mailing list, along with document 
authors and WG chairs, would be expected to attend on Mondays so that 
they could catch up on the material.  Everyone else could show up on 
Tuesday and stay through Friday.

I'm also tempted to suggest that there be an extra charge for attendance 
on Mondays (other than for WG chairs and people presenting material), 
with the proceeds split between the secretariat and the people doing 
presentations.

I honestly think that "catch up" sessions could be quite valuable in 
several ways.  They could help newcomers to a particular WG get up to 
speed, they could facilitate more cross-area review, they could make the 
  real discussions more effective by minimizing time spent explaining 
things to those who weren't caught up.

Keith

---

From: Kurt Erik Lindqvist <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:47:21 +0200

> proposed experiment will be discussed on the IETF Didcussion mail

so while I sympathize with the need for this, and won't argue against  
it. I do want to point out that it means that overseas travelers will  
be 'stuck' for another day (depending on where in the world we are,  
you can normally make an afternoon overseas flight, but not if we have  
an afternoon slot). So in order for you to get enough data - I would  
strongly urge you to also have an afternoon slot in a non-north  
american meeting location and only afterwards analyze the data.

Best regards,

- kurtis -

---

From: Iljitsch van Beijnum <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 21:26:25 +0200

On 18 jul 2008, at 9:47, Kurt Erik Lindqvist wrote:

> so while I sympathize with the need for this, and won't argue  
> against it. I do want to point out that it means that overseas  
> travelers will be 'stuck' for another day (depending on where in the  
> world we are, you can normally make an afternoon overseas flight,  
> but not if we have an afternoon slot). So in order for you to get  
> enough data - I would strongly urge you to also have an afternoon  
> slot in a non-north american meeting location and only afterwards  
> analyze the data.

Actually the connections from Dublin to the rest of Europe aren't so  
great that it's possible to fly back friday evening for everyone. In  
my case (Madrid) I'm staying until saturday to attend the RRG session  
that runs until five.

What might be illuminating is to to a quick poll on the RRG list so we  
can correlate home region with:

- flying home after RRG on friday
- flying home after leaving RRG early on friday
- flying home saturday after RRG

And then of course the same for the extra sessions on friday in  
Minneapolis.
_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 15:48:06 -0400

> slot in a non-north american meeting location and only afterwards  

Of course, it is hard to get a late flight back to the US from Europe  
- the basic rule seems to be that airlines try not to have
flights arrive in the middle of the night. (BTW, flights to / from  
India can certainly violate this in my experience.)

So, I have a 6:00 AM flight from Dublin on Saturday August 2nd. Joy.

Marshall

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 22:55:11 +0200

Fred Baker wrote:
>
> On Jul 18, 2008, at 7:50 AM, Cyrus Daboo wrote:
>
>> Rather than expanding the number of slots why don't we look at using 
>> the time we have more efficiently.
>
> Let me throw in v6ops as an example. We are very efficient, I think - 
> we have 10-15 minute discussions on each of a number of drafts in our 
> time. I would often like to allow a discussion to be longer, for the 
> same reason that we meet f2f in the first place - we'd like to get all 
> the opinions on the table and come to some sense of closure. I am 
> having two meetings in the course of the week and finding myself 
> rushing discussions along.

My recollection is that you do publicize the agenda well in advance, and 
that's a big improvement over many working groups.  Here's the real 
question, Fred: when you guys go through your meetings, how much could 
have been done as a VoD?  What I mean by that is how much discussion 
occurs on each particular presentation?  This might be something for 
chairs to measure at Dublin as input into this process.

Eliot

---

From: James Galvin <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 16:59:24 -0400

The question I have is what are we trying to achieve, i.e., what 
problem are we trying to solve?

Is the problem really just that we want all WGs who want a second 
(or even third) meeting slot to be able to get one?

Do we have any statistics on how many groups meet at each meeting?

Assuming a full 8-track meeting is available during each time slot, 
there are 128 meeting times available.  With about 120 working 
groups that's 1 slot each "guaranteed" at each meeting, which does 
not account for the area meetings or BOF meetings.

This means that no WG should expect more than 1 time slot.  The 
fact that any secondary slot is available is entirely dependent on 
the number of groups that actually meet.

What we have is a scaling problem and the question is how are we 
going to solve it, assuming we agree on the scaling problem that 
needs a solution.

You're proposing adding 16 meeting slots, which is 12.5% increase 
in the number of slots overall and 50% increase in the number of 1 
hour slots.

Is adding 16 more slots sufficient to ensure that on average any WG 
that wants a second meeting slot will get it?  How long will this 
extra allocation of time slots last before we need another solution 
to the not enough meeting slots problem?

Why isn't the answer to tell the working group to have interim 
meetings?  Of course, we probably we need to revise the process for 
this so it is more streamlined.

How about a policy that favors second time slots only for better 
functioning WGs (a la Dave Crocker's grading suggestion) or for 
better prepared WGs (those that do not suffer from the perennial 
problem of publishing an agenda).

Brian Carpenter asked how we will measure success.  I think we need 
to more clearly state the problem we are trying to solve first.

Jim

-- On Thursday, July 17, 2008 2:33 PM -0700 IETF Chair 
<[email-masked]> wrote regarding Proposed Experiment: More Meeting 
Time on Friday for IETF 73 --

> and we would like community comments before we proceed.
> Face-to-face meeting time is very precious, especially with about
> 120 IETF WGs competing for meeting slots.  Several WGs are not
> able to get as much meeting time as they need to progress their
> work.  As an experiment, we are considering adding two Friday
> afternoon one-hour meeting slots. The proposed Friday schedule
> would be:
>

---

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 07:50:00 +0200

> - flying home saturday after RRG

I won't attend RRG at all this trip, and I have repeatedly had to leave 
early in the past because of flight schedules.  Not that I mind, by the 
way.  I haven't found the meeting time particularly useful.  Perhaps 
others have.

Eliot

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 10:04:12 -0400

On Jul 18, 2008, at 3:26 PM, Iljitsch van Beijnum wrote:

>> travelers will be 'stuck' for another day (depending on where in  
>> the world we are, you can normally make an afternoon overseas  
>> flight, but not if we have an afternoon slot). So in order for you  
>> to get enough data - I would strongly urge you to also have an  
>> afternoon slot in a non-north american meeting location and only  
>> afterwards analyze the data.
>
> my case (Madrid) I'm staying until saturday to attend the RRG  
> session that runs until five.
>
> What might be illuminating is to to a quick poll on the RRG list so  
> we can correlate home region with:
>

The earliest flight I could find to Washington, DC after 5:00 PM  
Dublin time is 6:00 AM the next morning.

The principal here is fairly straightforward - modern airliners travel  
at very roughly the speed of the Earth's rotation at
45 degrees latitude. So, assuming that the latitude of departure and  
arrival is roughly the same, for trips East the clock time difference  
is roughly twice the trip duration, for trips West the clock time  
difference is roughly zero. The jet stream flows West to East, and  
thus slows down trips West and speeds up trips East, but this gives  
the picture.

Airlines try and avoid leaving or arriving between mid-night and 6 AM,  
and strongly prefer arriving and leaving during normal working hours  
if possible. For intercontinental trips East of, say 8 hours duration,  
the clock time difference will be 12 hours or more, and that gives a  
preponderance of overnight flights, with a few in the early morning  
arriving late the same evening. Going West, there is more flexibility,  
as the clock time difference is small, but you will typically not have  
any late evening flights, and lots of morning ones.

So, a meeting in the US can end at 5:00 PM and people will be able to  
get flights to Europe that evening, but for a meeting
in Europe ending at 5:00 PM will generally mean a flight the next  
morning.

For the very long flights that you get in Asia, these principles break  
down. (For example, India to Europe flights frequently leave very  
early, 1:00 AM or so local time. I was told by a pilot that the planes  
from Europe refuel in India and return the same night and that with  
the flight times and the refueling time it was not possible to put all  
4 departures and arrivals during normal waking hours, and so one of  
the 4 had to be in the middle of the night.)

Regards
Marshall

---

From: Iljitsch van Beijnum <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2008 17:09:11 +0200

> Dublin time is 6:00 AM the next morning.

That's an insane time to fly...

> So, a meeting in the US can end at 5:00 PM and people will be able  
> to get flights to Europe that evening,

If the meeting ends at five the earliest flight you could take would  
be around eight. There may be one or two, but most are (much) earlier.

> but for a meeting

Right. Then again, a quick sampling shows that the majority of the  
flights are earlier in the day so you wouldn't be able to make them  
(allowing enough time to get to the airport, check in and go through  
security) if you leave at 1130.

If for most people staying until 1515 or so means traveling the next  
day anyway, we may as well make friday a regular working day and have  
sessions until dinner time...
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From: Dave Cridland <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 20:31:28 +0100

The IETF mailserver will reject this mail because I have the temerity  
to use IPv6 without a PTR record (and sorting that out involves  
finding another nameserver), so feel free to quote gratuitously...

On Fri Jul 18 19:28:26 2008, Keith Moore wrote:
> I'm also tempted to suggest that there be an extra charge for  
> attendance on Mondays (other than for WG chairs and people  
> presenting material), with the proceeds split between the  
> secretariat and the people doing presentations.
> 
> 
Definitely against this - paying per presentation just fills me with  
horror. Most people have to travel over a weekend anyway, so its  
either the weekend before, with all the tutorials, or after, with  
nothing.

> I honestly think that "catch up" sessions could be quite valuable  
> in several ways.  They could help newcomers to a particular WG get  
> up to speed, they could facilitate more cross-area review, they  
> could make the  real discussions more effective by minimizing time  
> spent explaining things to those who weren't caught up.

Now this really makes me think - what if Monday was filled with  
lightning talk style quick-fire presentations on various WGs and  
documents? I suspect more or less one track per Area or perhaps AD  
would work, with presentations limited to 5 or 10 minutes. There's no  
need to limit this to just WGs, either - key WG docs could have their  
own talk, as could individual documents.

The result would be that on Mondays, attendees could very easily do a  
catch-up and cross-area run.

I think we would really benefit from this, as it'd provide an  
excellent place to gain good cross-area awareness - and that ought to  
breed better review and integration.

Dave.
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  - acap://acap.dave.cridland.net/byowner/user/dwd/bookmarks/
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From: "Tom.Petch" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 11:51:12 +0200

----- Original Message -----
From: "Cyrus Daboo" <[email-masked]>
To: "Eric Rescorla" <[email-masked]>; "Eliot Lear" <[email-masked]>
Cc: "IETF Chair" <[email-masked]>; <[email-masked]>; "IETF Announcement list"
<[email-masked]>; <[email-masked]>
Sent: Friday, July 18, 2008 4:50 PM
Subject: Re: Proposed Experiment: More Meeting Time on Friday for IETF 73

> How much work at a meeting could actually have been done on the mailing

A lot of it; too many meetings I have attended consist of presentations on I-Ds
which add nothing to that which could have been learnt beforehand by spending an
evening reading the I-D.
> What work do we do at a meeting that can't be easily done via a mailing

Not much; meetings in person can progress discussions faster provided all the
parties are present. e-mail is slug-mail compared to face-to-face discussions,
but it does depend on the parties being present.  Also, once you get above a
dozen or so active participants, you get those queues at the microphone so that
the response comes several round trips after the question making the discussions
hard to follow.

For me, the strongest requirement for meetings in person is for BOFs; for the
first one or two of a new working group, when the sap is rising; and for groups
that appear moribund (so the IESG can see if the working group should be wound
up).  Less often, there is a case for one when there is a hot technical issue on
which the working group is bogged down between competing proposals (IPv6 comes
to mind)

Tom Petch.

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:45:51 -0400

--On Friday, 18 July, 2008 17:53 +0300 Jari Arkko
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> For local flights, what would be the effect? I don't have a
> lot of experience with US local flights... maybe you can fill
> me in? To look at this, I entered a few major cities on both
> coasts into my flight booking tool, and it showed flights from
> Minneapolis leaving throughout the day. For west coast, the
> last flights seemed to leave about 10 PM or so, for east coast
> sometime after 6 PM. You could still make a 6 PM flight even

Not, in the general case, if you follow the rules and especially
if you have any inclination to avoid very expensive cab fares
(although the EUR 40 "opportunity" in Dublin with no coach or
train service _to the hotel_ is probably a new low).  In theory,
a 6 PM international flight says that you are supposed to be at
the airport at 4 PM.   That gives you 45 minutes to get out of
the meeting, collect bags if needed, find a taxi or synchronize
with a coach, and get to the airport.   Maybe.

Minneapolis is actually an odd case.  It is centrally-located
(as these things go) and a major connecting hub for one
important airline (a situation that may not last very long in
that particular case).  For places to which Northwest does not
fly, or for anyone for whom Northwest is a "do not fly if at all
avoidable" carrier, things get quite a lot worse.  For example,
a departure from Minneapolis at 19:00 that requires a domestic
connection may miss a "latest departure" window and require an
overnight stay at the intermediate point.  Chicago shares the
same general location advantages but has hub-quality service
from several carriers, so one is less likely to get trapped.

By contrast, consider the possibility of meetings on either of
two coasts of the US.   From the east coast, almost all flights
to Europe leave late afternoon or evening (there are a few
exceptions for selected city pairs), so a noon-ending meeting
works for a Friday departure.  Whether a mid-afternoon ending
works depends on distance to the airport, check-in time
requirements, and so on.  For example, there are city pairs for
which the latest Boston departure is around 4PM, for which see
above.   Asian flights tend to leave relatively early in the
morning, so either even Friday morning sessions get blown off
(relatively safe for most people in recent years) or there is
going to be an overnight stay.   From the west coast, both Asian
and European flights tend to leave mid-day to early afternoon --
one might get to one morning session, but finishing at noon or
later will mean an overnight stay before departing for most city
pairs.  And, again for most city pairs on the east coast of the
US (especially destinations the prohibit late-night flight
operations), the cutoff before a flight turns into an
otherwise-avoidable red eye is between 2 and 4 PM depending on
the departure airport.

> Anyway, my conclusion from this very unscientific study is
> that while having a longer Friday certainly means arriving
> home hours later, it would still seem to be possible for at
> least some people to go back the same day.

It is almost always possible.  And I always appreciate, in
principle, the fact that many flights to the US from Asia permit
me to arrive before I left (of course, my body doesn't
understand that wrt jet lag).   But...

> But are there other factors at play? Need to arrive home
> sooner? Too tired on Fridays? Would have to carry luggage
> around if the hotel checkout time cannot be extended? Rules or
> preferences about airline selection affect availability of
> flights? Week is already long enough?

Yes.  In order:  Yes (for me, unnecessarily losing the ability
to spend the weekend -- starting early Saturday if not Friday
night-- with friends and extended family is a big deal.  It is
probably an even bigger deal for many folks with small
children).  Yes.  Yes (see above).  And Yes.  FYI, the IESG
tried, some years ago, to hold a Friday get-together to review
the week, plan for the future, avoid lots of breakfast meetings
that kept ADs away from the community, and save the expense of
separate retreats.   It really seemed like a good idea until we
discovered that, after 4+ days of intense meetings, we just sat
around and started at each other.  Of course, that was while we
were still doing evening (after dinner) meetings including
open-ended plenaries, so maybe it would be different now.

That, in turn, leads to an experimental evaluation that I'd
encourage the IESG to perform before launching this particular
"more Friday" experiment.   That is to measure, however
subjectively, how effective WGs are that meet in Friday after
their participants have been at the meeting all week and active
in meeting sessions (groups that meet only Friday and that have
significant people flying in on Thursday don't count).

> P.S. I generally do not leave until Saturday anyway, mostly
> because I often have private meetings after the sessions. And
> RRG meets until 5pm Friday in any case. And I would be too
> tired to pack and fly on Friday.

Ok.  But, if the IESG fills up Friday with sessions, some of
which you need to attend, would, for example, RRG shift to
Saturday, leaving you with the necessity for a Sunday departure?
That is the other potential consequence of this plan: lots of
things do go on Friday, some in parallel with the
lightly-scheduled Friday morning slots and some into and through
the afternoon.   If this proposed more intense use of Friday
pushes those activities into Saturday, the meeting is getting
really long, especially for those whose meetings now start the
previous Saturday or Sunday morning.

Again, I think the real thing that this all points to is the
need to be probing the reasons why people think they need more
time, rather than moving immediately toward ways to give it to
them because they have asked.

     john

---

From: Nathaniel Borenstein <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:09:13 -0400

>  -2:  In very serious trouble

+3.  A truly promising idea, I think.  I'd like to see the number  
based largely on the subjective assessment of as many participants as  
possible.  Maximizing anonymity in the evaluations would be very  
important, of course.  -- Nathaniel

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From: Ned Freed <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:21:09 -0700 (PDT)

+1

I will also note that telling people they cannot meet to discuss things is
about as effective as telling water it cannot flow downhill. In practice what
often happens is that some small and highly motivated subset meets and
discusses things privately, rules be damned.

				Ned

---

From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:33:29 -0700

No, cramming things in tighter isn't the solution. Interims perhaps,  
but that means more travel. I'm all for teleconferencing, but there  
are issues with that as well - that implies IP Multicast deployment,  
relatively high bandwidth for multiple unicast sessions, or access to  
a central server, and all that has to pass through firewalls. The IAOC  
conferencing committee has tried Skype (limited person count and not  
that great of sound) and Marratech (works well for IAOC, ISOC Board,  
and various ISOC committees), but the IESG and IAB have not to date  
tried Marratech. Other alternatives like WebEx imply ongoing finances.  
ISOC could beef up its Marratech server and make it available to IETF  
WGs, or the Secretariat could, but making that investment requires a  
commitment that it will be productively used - the IESG and IAB have  
to get on board.

 From my perspective, I have been attending meetings on the weekends  
fore and aft of the IETF meeting for years, and consider using the  
time Friday (as noted, RAI already does) to be very reasonable.

The thing that surprises me in this discussion is, frankly, the  
representation of it as an "experiment". In my book, it's not an  
experiment, it is an expansion of available meeting slots. It is  
neither successful nor unsuccessful, as I doubt that that terms having  
the kind of meaningful criteria that Brian suggests exist. The  
question is whether the meetings are effective, and whether the  
Secretariat finds it easier to meet the various demands placed on it.  
I don't see how "more resources" can avoid making the Secretariat's  
job easier. The question is how we use them.
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---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 15:44:20 -0400

Given the relatively important meetings that tend to occur on
Saturday and Sunday before the main IETF meeting, the Sunday
tutorials, this would probably not let nearly enough people show
up Monday afternoon (for Tuesday meetings) to be worth it.  Now,
if one adopted your suggestion but but the "overview session" on
the previous Friday, that would be a different matter... except
that the people for whom those sessions would be most important
would not come.

     john

--On Friday, 18 July, 2008 14:28 -0400 Keith Moore
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>> Do we spend too much time with overviews of drafts that
>> really should  have been read by all attendees beforehand?
>> Maybe it would be good for  the first session on Monday to be
>> an "Area Overview" session where an  overview of all the
>> latest drafts can be "presented" to give people a  broader
>> view of what is going on? Actually I have often felt that the 
>> IESG plenary would be a good place for area directors to give
>> status  updates/overviews of the work going on in their areas.
> 
> On reading this I found myself wondering if the "real" IETF WG
> meetings   - these consisting of actual discussions - should
> be Tuesday-Friday. Then Mondays could be used to conduct
> "presentation" or "introductory" or "catch up"  sessions for
> each of the WGs.  Attendees who hadn't read the documents and
> kept up with the mailing list, along with document authors and
> WG chairs, would be expected to attend on Mondays so that they
> could catch up on the material.  Everyone else could show up
> on Tuesday and stay through Friday.
> 
> I honestly think that "catch up" sessions could be quite
> valuable in several ways.  They could help newcomers to a
> particular WG get up to speed, they could facilitate more
> cross-area review, they could make the   real discussions more
> effective by minimizing time spent explaining things to those
> who weren't caught up.
> 
> Keith

---

From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:13:32 -0700

On Jul 18, 2008, at 1:55 PM, Eliot Lear wrote:

>>> Rather than expanding the number of slots why don't we look at  
>>> using the time we have more efficiently.
>>
>> Let me throw in v6ops as an example. We are very efficient, I think  
>> - we have 10-15 minute discussions on each of a number of drafts in  
>> our time. I would often like to allow a discussion to be longer,  
>> for the same reason that we meet f2f in the first place - we'd like  
>> to get all the opinions on the table and come to some sense of  
>> closure. I am having two meetings in the course of the week and  
>> finding myself rushing discussions along.
>
> My recollection is that you do publicize the agenda well in advance,  
> and that's a big improvement over many working groups.  Here's the  
> real question, Fred: when you guys go through your meetings, how  
> much could have been done as a VoD?  What I mean by that is how much  
> discussion occurs on each particular presentation?  This might be  
> something for chairs to measure at Dublin as input into this process.

We tend to have three categories of talks:

  - some that could be summarized as "please read my draft"
  - discussions resulting from drafts
  - groups of talks presenting different aspects of a common theme

An example of the third category is the NAT-PT++ discussion that has  
happened in v6ops and is now moving to behave. In IETF-70 I literally  
set aside a day (2.5 hours) for a collection of talks and ensuing  
microphone discussion on that topic. In IETF-71 we had an extended  
discussion on the resulting requirements draft, and in this meeting we  
will finalize that discussion and move to WG last call. Another  
example is various drafts discussing aspects of IPv6 CPE requirements.

An example of discussions arising from/around drafts is the Teredo  
issue. Microsoft published Teredo as a draft sponsored by Mark  
Townsley, and subsequently made numerous minor changes to it in  
response to field experience. Discussion arose from two quarters  
regarding Teredo, and we have had working group discussion of the  
issues raised. We now have a new draft on the topic that Dave Thaler  
contributed to which likely beings those discussions to rational  
closure.

Yes, we have some instances of "please read my draft", and I wish the  
v6ops community would make better use of the mailing list. But we do  
in fact have pretty wide-ranging discussion as well.
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---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 10:18:28 -0700

Fred Baker wrote:
>  w have 10-15 minute discussions on each of a number of drafts in our
>  same reason that we meet f2f in the first place -
> 
> 
> No, cramming things in tighter isn't the solution.

Fred,

This seems to be a classic example of taking a specific counter-example
and asserting that it generalizes for the whole.  I believe it is the
single-most damaging problem with how we publicly discuss change.

Anyone promoting a point of view is going to find an example to support
it.  What we need, instead, is a sense of "typical", to use as the base
for our consideration.  Yes, we also need to consider outliers, but we
need to treat them as such.

We have working groups that are very well run.  If, indeed, v6ops is an
example -- I have no knowledge and therefore no opinion -- and if that
type of working group is typical, then your conclusions probably should
apply to this topic.  But I believe it isn't typical -- indeed, I
believe what you describe is a long way from typical -- and therefore it
shouldn't be used as a pivotal basis for formulating strategic aspects
of change.

At the least, when anyone puts forward a particular example, they need
to explain why anyone should believe that that example applies more
generally, both in terms of the group and in terms of individual
participants.  (Some don't mind hitting the weekend, others do.)

If we believe that most IETF working groups are doing productive work
and most IETF meeting time is well-used, but it isn't sufficient, then
yes we need more meeting time.

If either of these two predicates do not apply, then we do not need more
meeting time.  We need changes in how we assign and use the time already
available.

> representation of it as an "experiment".

+1

> The question is whether the meetings are effective, and whether the

While agreeing with your last sentence, I think the rest of your 
paragraph contains the trap of assuming that more/bigger is always 
better.  I bet you don't really mean that.  For example, it does not 
make the Secretariat's job easier for them to have to work more hours...

d/

ps.  Even if we decide that the average group is not well run and
doesn't need more time, there will of course be productive, well-run
groups that do, indeed, need more time.  They should get it.  Oh, wait a
minute, they already do.  They need even more?  OK, give it to them.
Even at the expense of other wgs...

-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 10:49:01 -0700

Fred Baker wrote:
> So, you are asserting that the primary working groups that I interact 
> with, of which v6ops is typical, are all outliers.

Possibly.  But, yes, possibly not.  My point is that this discussion 
hasn't considered the question.  (Based on RFC 5218, each of us ought to 
be aggresively careful about our beliefs in what is typical for the IETF...)

> I suspect that the story of several blind wise men describing an 
> elephant is relevant here. 

Exactly right.  Which is why discussions like these should spend serious 
energy worrying about what is typical.

Yup

> To be honest, I think the body that has the best collective view is the 
> IESG and/or the IAB. Reason: as a group, they monitor all working groups 
> and they collectively compare notes.

 From a theoretical standpoint, I agree.  From a practical one, I don't.

There is too much history of seeing the larger IETF community assert 
that IETF management is out of touch with this kind of reality.

At the least, IETF management comprises people with no particular 
background in making these sorts of assessments.  (Of course, some are 
excellent at it, so again the question is about 'typical'.)

For something like this, there needs to be a combination of assessment 
from management and assessment from participants.

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 19:30:00 +0100

> > To elaborate, my understanding is that the rules for 
> teleconferencing 
> > are governed by the rules for interim meetings, which require 
> > something like one month's advance notice plus attendance 
> requirements 
> > at the previous IETF, and a minimum period of time between 
> meetings.  

> I will also note that telling people they cannot meet to 
> discuss things is about as effective as telling water it 
> cannot flow downhill.

In any case, what is "teleconferencing"?

Does it include someone running a realtime meeting on an IM service?
Note that these days, IM services can include video and audio.

If you use a service like that provided by webex.com does that make it a
teleconference?

If you have an audio conference call using SIP/VoIP over the Internet,
is that a teleconference?

One wonders why the IETF persists in using old technology long after the
real world has shifted to leveraging the very technology that the IETF
created in the first place? Really, the place for experiments is to
supplement mailing lists with a variety of other Internet-based
interaction technologies. Experiment with various of these possibilities
and find out what works. This should take the load off the face-to-face
meetings so that there is no need to extend IETF meetings.

Maybe they could even be shortened?

--Michael Dillon

---

From: <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 22:31:31 +0100

> "Teleconferencing", in this context, includes any 
> communications vehicle that enables participants to meet 
> without having to travel, and which they all agree to. Could 
> be telephone, skype with or without video, Marratech, Webex, 
> Citrix, or anything else as long as they all agree.

Sounds to me like it means "any technology which requires the Internet"
since email functions quite nicely using non-Internet technologies like
UUCP. Why does the IETF have rules which hamper using the Internet to
develop Internet-based protocols?

And then use that as an excuse to lengthen the face-to-face meetings
making it even harder for people who are not IETF fanatics, or funded by
their vendor-employer to attend them?

The IETF really needs to sit up and take notice of how other development
projects leverage the Internet, such as the many open-source software
projects. I'm not saying that all WGs should be forced to start using
blogs or IM chat sessions or whatever. Rather, I think the IETF should
formally get rid of that teleconference rule, and actively encourage WGs
to experiment with new ways of working that leverage Internet
technologies, and which reduce the amount of time needed in face-to-face
meetings.

That would be worthy of the title "experiment".

--Michael Dillon

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:27:26 +1200

>> notice periods be reduced to two weeks, and that AD approval not be

I don't think f2f meetings have ever been compulsory, have they?
There have certainly been WGs that have avoided them once the
work was well started.

I agree that 2 weeks notice is usually enough for any form of
teleconference, but some people may find it hard to reschedule
things, so more notice is always better. 4 weeks is an absolute
minimum for a meeting requiring travel.

I guess the AD approval for f2f interim meetings was put in place
to allow for a check that the general open-access requirements
are being met, and to ensure that the AD can actually attend
the meeting personally. If that became a WG chair responsibility,
there would need to be a clear way for people to object, which
would end up as an appeal to the AD anyway.

> discusses things privately, rules be damned.

I think we all know that such small discussions are often the source of
breakthroughs. afaik that has never been forbidden, but by definition
such a discussion cannot claim to define WG consensus.

    Brian

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 21:34:00 -0400

Dear Brian;

> minimum for a meeting requiring travel.

My personal feeling is that, if the IETF wants to routinely use  
videoconferencing or
telepresence to further its work, a substantial and continuing effort  
will be needed to
make it happen in a reliable, effective and robust fashion. Generally,  
with the IETF even
a conference bridge is planned late in the process; my experience with
teleconferencing and telepresence is that it needs to be planned in  
from the start and
may be expensive to set up and run, although there should be larger  
savings in the avoidance of the
time and expense required for travel.

I would be glad to participate in any "IETF telepresence" BOF, bar or  
otherwise.

Regards
Marshall

>> about as effective as telling water it cannot flow downhill. In  
>> practice
>> what

---

From: "David Harrington" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:12:30 -0400

Hi,

I support this experiment. Why short sessions? Why not longer
sessions?

In my experience, Friday sessions are invaluable for having "working"
sessions rather than status sessions, and Friday sessions have been
preferred in some WGs as a way to get real f2f time for engineering. 

David Harrington
[email-masked]
[email-masked]
[email-masked]

> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On 
> Behalf Of IETF Chair
> Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2008 5:33 PM
and

---

From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 10:34:28 -0700

On Jul 21, 2008, at 10:18 AM, Dave Crocker wrote:

> Anyone promoting a point of view is going to find an example to  
> support it.  What we need, instead, is a sense of "typical", to use  
> as the base for our consideration.  Yes, we also need to consider  
> outliers, but we need to treat them as such.

I suspect that the story of several blind wise men describing an  
elephant is relevant here. My view of the elephant is as I described.  
Your view of the elephant may vary.

To be honest, I think the body that has the best collective view is  
the IESG and/or the IAB. Reason: as a group, they monitor all working  
groups and they collectively compare notes. I am prone to let them  
make the assessment. The point has been made in this thread and in  
others that there is a perception that working groups are in many  
cases inefficient, and if one of them is reading the thread maybe they  
can chime in to say "got that".
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---

From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2008 11:52:12 -0700

IMHO, defining things to a gnat's eyelash is mostly employment for  
lawyer-wannabes, and doesn't necessarily help in reality.

"Teleconferencing", in this context, includes any communications  
vehicle that enables participants to meet without having to travel,  
and which they all agree to. Could be telephone, skype with or without  
video, Marratech, Webex, Citrix, or anything else as long as they all  
agree.

On Jul 21, 2008, at 11:30 AM, <[email-masked]> <[email-masked] 
 > wrote:

---

From: Eric Burger <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2008 16:25:52 -0400

I will take a swag...

On the one hand, having had (and, believe it or not, this time by  
request) work group meetings on Friday morning, the Friday slot is an  
excellent filter to ensure that only the die-hard participants and  
those people paying their own way who need a Saturday Night Stay(tm)  
attend.

On the other hand, this guarantees more than a week away from home.   
If you have no family or life or want to stay away from said family or  
life, this would be a good thing.  However, for the rest of us, this  
is not an attractive option.

Since Pandora's Box is now formally open, how about this: since the  
Internet Area has a lion's share of slots, and RAI draws huge crowds,  
what if we went summer / winter olympics and (gasp!) add a fourth  
annual meeting, but not have all areas meet at all meetings.

Yes, for me that just means four meetings to go to instead of three.  
However, one would hope we could get the work done Monday - Friday,  
instead of Saturday - Saturday, which we really are talking about  
here. Moreover, there really are people that will never venture  
outside their area, no matter how much we tell them it is important  
for them, and the IETF as a whole, to do it. Thus, rather than  
fighting physics, let us embrace gravity and make for a more sensible  
schedule all around.

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:14:20 -0400

Dear Eric;

On Jul 22, 2008, at 4:25 PM, Eric Burger wrote:

> request) work group meetings on Friday morning, the Friday slot is  
> an excellent filter to ensure that only the die-hard participants  
> and those people paying their own way who need a Saturday Night  
> Stay(tm) attend.
>
> If you have no family or life or want to stay away from said family  
> or life, this would be a good thing.  However, for the rest of us,  
> this is not an attractive option.
>
> Internet Area has a lion's share of slots, and RAI draws huge  
> crowds, what if we went summer / winter olympics and (gasp!) add a  
> fourth annual meeting, but not have all areas meet at all meetings.

This is my option 4. I think that a variant, call it 4.a, might also  
be useful :

Have 4 meetings per year, but close the meeting down Thursday evening.  
This would save a little money per meeting, raise
more money for the IETF (by having 4 meetings) and would mean that for  
most of us, the IETF would only eat 1 weekend, not 2.

Here are the stats. I don't think that adding even a 4 day meeting  
could be scheduled before 2010, if then.

Option    Extra          Rough Cost / Year     Biggest Drawback IMHO
          Slots / year
1         48-72          $ 100,000 to 140,000  Staying Friday night
2         108            $  90,000             Staying late at night
3         48             $ 140,000             AD availability,  
collisions
4         117            highly profitable     Extra travel, would  
have to wait till at least 2010
4.a       97             profitable            Extra travel, would  
have to wait till at least 2010
5         24-32          neutral or profit     Extra travel,  
inefficient  for attendees

Regards
Marshall

> fighting physics, let us embrace gravity and make for a more  
> sensible schedule all around.
>

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:37:21 -0400

Dear Eric
On Jul 23, 2008, at 12:25 PM, Eric Burger wrote:

> Can you enumerate the various options? Thanks.

See the attached email which describes them - here is the list with a  
description of each. If you can think up more,
let me know.

Marshall

Option Description            Extra          Rough Cost / Year        
Biggest Drawback IMHO
                             Slots / year
1    More Friday Sessions      48-72          $ 100,000 to 140,000    
Staying Friday night
2    After Dinner Sessions     108            $  90,000               
Staying late at night
3    9 simultaneous sessions    48            $ 140,000               
AD availability, collisions
4    4 meetings / year         117            highly profitable       
Extra travel, would have to wait till at least 2010
4.a  4 meetings, no Friday      97            profitable              
Extra travel, would have to wait till at least 2010
5    Area interim meetings    24-32           neutral or profitable   
Extra travel, inefficient for attendees

 From an email to this list, July 17, 2008 9:48:22 PM EDT

Dear Russ;

- support the experiment

Regards
Marshall
>
>
> On Jul 23, 2008, at 12:14 PM, Marshall Eubanks wrote:
>
>> Dear Eric;
>>
>>> On the other hand, this guarantees more than a week away from  
>>> home.  If you have no family or life or want to stay away from  
>>> said family or life, this would be a good thing.  However, for the  
>>> rest of us, this is not an attractive option.
>>>
>>> Since Pandora's Box is now formally open, how about this: since  
>>> the Internet Area has a lion's share of slots, and RAI draws huge  
>> This is my option 4. I think that a variant, call it 4.a, might  
>> also be useful :
>>
>> Have 4 meetings per year, but close the meeting down Thursday  
>> evening. This would save a little money per meeting, raise
>> more money for the IETF (by having 4 meetings) and would mean that  
>> for most of us, the IETF would only eat 1 weekend, not 2.
>>
>>> Yes, for me that just means four meetings to go to instead of  
>>> three. However, one would hope we could get the work done Monday -  
>>> Friday, instead of Saturday - Saturday, which we really are  
>>> talking about here. Moreover, there really are people that will  
>>> never venture outside their area, no matter how much we tell them  
>>> it is important for them, and the IETF as a whole, to do it. Thus,  
>>> rather than fighting physics, let us embrace gravity and make for  
>>> a more sensible schedule all around.
>>>

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:23:10 -0400

Michael:

There is at least one WG that never held a single face-to-face 
meeting.  They are certainly not required.

Many WGs do take advantage of non-face-to-face meeting alternatives 
to resolve issues between meetings.  For example, single-topic jabber 
chats have been scheduled and used.  The announcement of the jabber 
room and time were announced 30 days in advance to allow plenty of 
time for people to adjust their schedules, and then the agenda for 
each jabber session was posted as soon as the topic was 
selected.  All of this is well within the guidelines for interim meetings.

I'm sure others have similar experience to share.

Russ

---

From: Marc Manthey <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:10:55 +0200

hello  experts

just a question ,  why not use

<http://www.accessgrid.org/>  you could save a lot of CO2 ;)

just my 2 cents

regards

Marc

>> > without having to travel,

--

Les enfants teribbles - research and deployment
Marc Manthey - head of research and innovation
Hildeboldplatz 1a D - 50672 Köln - Germany
Tel.:0049-221-3558032
Mobil:0049-1577-3329231
jabber :[email-masked]
blog : http://www.let.de
ipv6 http://stattfernsehen.com
xing : https://www.xing.com/profile/Marc_Manthey

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2008 08:52:46 -0400

> <http://www.accessgrid.org/>  you could save a lot of CO2 ;)

Accessgrid in my experience requires some work to set up and use (and  
troubleshoot). There is
no question that it could be useful - so could be VRVS / EVO and their  
commercial analogues such as Marratech,
UMeeting and Team Speak, or even Telepresence of the Cisco or Polycom  
RPX varieties. All could be useful; there
are significant differences in cost, features and capabilities between  
solutions and it is not clear to me
which would be best for the IETF.

I would recommend that we actually study and evaluate
the choices available, rather than picking one because someone is  
familiar with it or some
other group uses it.

Regards
Marshall

---

From: Marc Manthey <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:18:52 +0200

Am 24.07.2008 um 14:52 schrieb Marshall Eubanks:
> Accessgrid in my experience requires some work to set up and use  
> (and troubleshoot).

hello Marshall,

thanks for your response ,  from my perspective , accessgrid run  
without trouble
on osx , just installed it from binary and it uses opensource  
( jabber ) and free resources
like vic and rat and is available for Windows aswell. There is  
continue developing , even h264 is available now

<http://mediatools.cs.ucl.ac.uk/nets/mmedia/>

> There is no question that it could be useful - so could be VRVS /  
> EVO and their commercial analogues such as Marratech,

marratech was aquired by google in 2005 , so i guess its not available  
anymore ( was java by the way and a bit slow )

AFAIK , VRVS / EVO  is not available for PC

> UMeeting and Team Speak, or even Telepresence of the Cisco or  
> Polycom RPX varieties.

Dont know "Umeeting "  but Teamspeak is not open source aswell and  
does not support video and this would be helpful for presenting slides
in a "venue"

> I would recommend that we actually study and evaluate the choices  
> available,

+1

i think it would be a great improvement for developers / attendies  
from third world countrys or people that cant afford traveling to the  
meeting.

regards

have a nice day

Marc

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2008 10:04:50 -0400

Hello Marc;

On Jul 24, 2008, at 9:18 AM, Marc Manthey wrote:

> marratech was aquired by google in 2005 , so i guess its not  
> available anymore ( was java by the way and a bit slow )
>

Marratech is currently being used by the IAOC for its meetings, so I  
am familiar with it.
It works OK but has some tendency to crash.

I am not sure why being acquired by Google makes it unusable for us,  
or if being open-source is a requirement or
even a SHOULD. But that's why there is a consensus process here.

Regards
Marshall

> from third world countrys or people that cant afford traveling to  
> the meeting.

---

From: Eric Burger <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:25:04 -0400

On Jul 23, 2008, at 12:14 PM, Marshall Eubanks wrote:

>> home.  If you have no family or life or want to stay away from said  
>> family or life, this would be a good thing.  However, for the rest  
>> of us, this is not an attractive option.
>>
>> Friday, instead of Saturday - Saturday, which we really are talking  
>> about here. Moreover, there really are people that will never  
>> venture outside their area, no matter how much we tell them it is  
>> important for them, and the IETF as a whole, to do it. Thus, rather  
>> than fighting physics, let us embrace gravity and make for a more

---

From: Eric Burger <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:47:58 -0400

Oh yes.  I too like the 4a option!!!

Thanks!

On Jul 23, 2008, at 12:37 PM, Marshall Eubanks wrote:

> See the attached email which describes them - here is the list with  
> a description of each. If you can think up more,
> let me know.
>
> Marshall
>
> It seems to me that the IETF is bursting at the seams. Certainly  
> both the number of interim meetings seems to be increasing (are  
> statistics on the number and attendance of interim meetings  
> available anywhere?), so it is reasonable to try and find means that  
> will provide more meeting slots.
>
> 1 - Add meetings to Friday (the proposed experiment). We could add  
> 3, but the experiment is for 2. If we kept the rest of the meeting  
> the same, then the 2 session option would add 16 sessions per  
> meeting, or 48 per year. If we add 3 sessions, there would be 24 per  
> meeting, or 72 per year. There would definitely be extra expenses  
> for these options :
>
> - Currently, the IETF is torn down starting at 1130 AM on Friday.  
> This obviously would not be possible with this option, and there  
> would almost certainly be an extra Verilan (Connectivity and NOC)  
> and maybe a AMS (Secretariat) expense, which presumably Ray could  
> estimate or get quotes for. For Vancouver, Verilan was $ 115,000, so  
> an extra half day would be about $ 25,000.
>
> unable to use our space for Friday evening parties. This might show  
> up (especially in the US) and an increased food and beverage cost  
> even if we don't provide refreshments, and Ray should see if that is  
> the case for Minneapolis. Likewise, there might be $ 5000 in Audio  
> Visual costs.
>
> some of these hotels will now be booked for Friday afternoon (or  
> will have Friday evening parties that will need the setup time), so  
> this option may not be possible for all of our future meetings.
>
> Friday night hotel room, then both participants and the IETF will  
> have a fairly considerable extra expense.
>
> 2 - Add evening sessions to the existing meetings, presumably after  
> a dinner break. This would add 8 x 4 = 36 slots per meeting, or 108  
> per year. It would probably not cost the IETF much (it is not clear  
> to me if Verilan would charge more for the longer hours; the total  
> charge for this in Vancouver was $ 115,000; the extra cost would ~ $  
> 30,000 ($90,000 / year) per meeting assuming a linear charge for the  
> extra time. I would expect the actual extra charge to be less; this  
> could be determined by Ray while he was doing the estimates for # 1.  
> I know that people did not like the meetings after dinner, so this  
> would probably be resisted, but it would add more slots and probably  
> at a lower price. I don't know if there would be extra hotel  
> charges, but I suspect not.
>
> upcoming hotels might not be able to support it. Basically all of  
> the costs (hotel, Verilan, etc.) would increase. Again assuming a  
> linear model for costs, the extra cost would be about $ 48,000 per  
> meeting, or $ 144,000 per year, or an extra $ 50 or so to the  
> registration fee.
>
> probably not be possible to schedule a fourth meeting before 2010,  
> if then.
>
> 5 - Having some sort of structured interim meeting or meetings  
> during the year. With 8 Areas, there could be 3 or 4 mini IETF's  
> during the year. If these area-interims lasted 2.5 days each, with  
> no simultaneous sessions, each might add 8 slots, or say 24 to 32  
> per year. I would assume that these meetings would be run to at  
> least recoup costs if not provide additional income for the IETF.  
> These meetings, being small, would be fairly easy to book, and  
> probably could start more or less immediately.
>
> area-interim, many might feel that had to attend more than one, so  
> in some ways this would cause more travel for attendees than option  
> 4, for many fewer additional slots. This option has, however, the  
> great advantage that WG could get a lot more focused time to work on  
> issues.
>
> that not everyone has to come to every day of the meeting, which  
> could have unpredictable results.
>
>>>> request) work group meetings on Friday morning, the Friday slot  
>>>> is an excellent filter to ensure that only the die-hard  
>>>> participants and those people paying their own way who need a  
>>>> Saturday Night Stay(tm) attend.
>>>>
>>>> said family or life, this would be a good thing.  However, for  
>>>> the rest of us, this is not an attractive option.
>>>>
>>>> crowds, what if we went summer / winter olympics and (gasp!) add  
>>>> a fourth annual meeting, but not have all areas meet at all  
>>>> meetings.
>>>
>>>> three. However, one would hope we could get the work done Monday  
>>>> - Friday, instead of Saturday - Saturday, which we really are  
>>>> it is important for them, and the IETF as a whole, to do it.  
>>>> Thus, rather than fighting physics, let us embrace gravity and  
>>>> make for a more sensible schedule all around.
>>>>

---

From: Marc Manthey <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:05:28 +0200

Am 24.07.2008 um 16:04 schrieb Marshall Eubanks:
> even a SHOULD.

gday again

sorry i thought  IEFT SHOULD use  non - patented and propietairy  
technologie.like jaber for i.e.

> But that's why there is a consensus process here.

i am looking forward to see / hear results ;)

regards

Marc

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jul 2008 09:13:27 +1200

> AFAIK , VRVS / EVO  is not available for PC

Not so, EVO works very well on Windows and is trivial
to install. The problem with EVO, Access Grid or the
commercial alternatives is not there - it's the extreme
difficulty of running an effective remote meeting with
more than a very small number (4 or 5) of participating
sites. So for a design team meeting it's fine, but for a
WG meeting I think you'd be quite disappointed.

   Brian

---

From: Marc Manthey <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:55:08 +0200

Am 24.07.2008 um 23:13 schrieb Brian E Carpenter:
>  it's the extreme difficulty of running an effective remote meeting  
> with
> more than a very small number (4 or 5) of participating sites. So  
> for a design team meeting it's fine, but for a WG meeting I think  
> you'd be quite disappointed.

thanks for your clarification brian,
i will see if i can get some more information from the developers  
regarding this issue.

Recently i found 2 other  interesting projects :

xcast

> About number of participants, logical limit is 126. It's because of
> number of IPv6 address emmbed in one routing option header of IPv6
> with other info. But when we cannot emmbed 126 when using ordinal
> Ethernet, 1500 MTU. With 1024 octet payload with RTP/UDP header, we
> can specify 14 participants in one IPv6 datagram with 1500 octet Ether
> datagram. You can increase participants by reducing payload size.
>
> We did video meetings with participants upto 16 approximately.

http://tools.ietf.org/id/draft-ooms-xcast-basic-spec-12.txt

http://www.xcast.jp/index.php/Main_Page

and telepathy , whitch is in a early  alpha phase

http://telepathy.freedesktop.org/wiki/Streamed%20Media

regards

Marc

---

From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2008 08:37:08 -0700

> available anymore ( was java by the way and a bit slow )

I keep hearing this, and I use it every week. Someday I'll figure out  
why people say this.
_______________________________________________
Ietf mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf

---

From: "Daniel Brown" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Jul 2008 14:14:47 -0400

On Thu, Jul 24, 2008 at 11:37 AM, Fred Baker <[email-masked]> wrote:
> I keep hearing this, and I use it every week. Someday I'll figure out why
> people say this.

    The same Marratech client available here?
(http://www.marratech.com/download/)

    Good thing someone mirrored it last year.  ;-P

-- 
</Daniel P. Brown>
Better prices on dedicated servers:
Intel 2.4GHz/60GB/512MB/2TB $49.99/mo.
Intel 3.06GHz/80GB/1GB/2TB $59.99/mo.
Dedicated servers, VPS, and hosting from $2.50/mo.
_______________________________________________
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---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:01:43 +0100

Fred,

> can chime in to say "got that".

I guess anyone who attends a lot of groups could have an opinion here. 
 From my point of view, we do have *some* WGs and sessions where time is 
typically not being used effectively. Focus on status reports, 
introduction to the topic (though sometimes that is justified), not 
organized enough to make progress in an issue, no progress between 
meetings, etc. In my area, we canceled the meeting of one WG which had 
these issues.

However, I think the *common case* is that WGs do have useful 
discussions. I looked at my own WGs, and 90% have significant issues in 
the agenda. Some have a lot to discuss, some have less.

I guess you could also look at how well the WGs run their discussions, 
even if they have topics suitable for f2f discussion. I can see some 
problems -- language issues, every now and then the presentations are 
confused, AV problems, wasting time on a side issue and not talking 
about the key problems, etc. But I'd say its human nature and its very 
hard to run a meeting so that everything goes perfectly.

Up-leveling a bit, if you have a hard technical problem to solve, having 
six (3x2) or seven and a half (3x2.5) hours f2f time a year is very 
little. Try to run a project with that much f2f time! Particularly when 
people have different backgrounds and different network pictures in 
their heads. Its takes time to understand what the other people are 
saying. It takes time to develop solutions to problems. Of course, a 
(well-run) IETF WG does a lot of its work on the list and through 
documents. But you also need some f2f time to go with that.

Among the various development efforts that I've been involved with 
(product development projects, standards bodies, research projects, 
policy development), the IETF probably has the lowest f2f/list effort 
ratio. My opinion is that the ratio should increase a bit, at least for 
some WGs. This thread is largely about how that could be arranged (via 
teleconferences, interim meetings, lengthening the meeting, trading some 
other time from the agenda to WG meetings, etc).

Jari