Subject: [newtrk] Fwd: I-D ACTION:draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00.txt

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2004 18:03:59 -0800

Folk,

The new I-D specifies only a WGS mechanism, with none of the standards
track distraction.

The current proposal has no IESG-related process.  It is strictly
working-group internal.

d/
--
 Dave Crocker <dcrocker-at-brandenburg-dot-com>
 Brandenburg InternetWorking <www.brandenburg.com>
 Sunnyvale, CA  USA <tel:+1.408.246.8253>

===== Forwarded message =====
From: [email-masked] <[email-masked]>
To: IETF-Announce: ;
Date: Thursday, March 25, 2004, 12:38:21 PM
Subject: I-D ACTION:draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00.txt

A New Internet-Draft is available from the on-line Internet-Drafts directories.

	Title		: Working Group Snapshot (WGS)
	Author(s)	: S. Dawkins, et al.
	Filename	: draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00.txt
	Pages		: 0
	Date		: 2004-3-25
	
This proposal defines an optional label that can be
     affixed to an Internet-Draft, for working group internal
     synchronization.  It is pointedly not an IETF standards
     label. Rather it is an optional part of the working group
     evelopment process, permitting the working group to
     synchronize on a particular version of a draft.

A URL for this Internet-Draft is:
http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00.txt

To remove yourself from the IETF Announcement list, send a message to 
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Internet-Drafts are also available by anonymous FTP. Login with the username
"anonymous" and a password of your e-mail address. After logging in,
type "cd internet-drafts" and then
	"get draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00.txt".

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===== End of original message text =====

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From: Alex Rousskov <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2004 16:31:28 -0700 (MST)

http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00.txt
defines WGS as an ``Internet-Draft that achieves "rough consensus"
based on a Working Group Last Call.'' I failed to find any other
usable definition/restriction in the draft. Please point me to one if
I missed it!

I am not sure how how to interpret the above. RFC 2418 seem to define
Working Group Last Call as the final step before submitting the draft
to IESG for publication. Is that the WG Last Call definition that WGS
draft is using? Or does the WGS draft mean last call in a more general
"Consensus Call" sense as in "WG last call to drop Bar feature from
Foo and move on with functionality work"?

"Example uses" in the draft seem to imply the latter, general meaning.
If that is the intent perhaps the WGS definition can be polished to
reflect the intent? Or is there a better, more general than RFC 2418,
WG Last Call definition?

I will assume the general meaning, since draft examples imply it. With
this meaning, WG Last Call always implies some action/statement that
the working group is asked to support. For example, "This is a WGLC
for draft foo-05: We are going to submit this document to IESG for
publication as PS. Please speak up if you have any problems with
that." Or "This is a WGLC for current Foo syntax. If you see any
problems with Section X.Y please post them by next Friday."  Etc.,
etc.

Given the spirit of draft-dawkins-newtrk-wgs-00, I assume that the
intent is to require the WG to define, as a part of WGS labeling, what
the claimed "rough consensus" was about. If that is not the intent,
please let me know what the true intent is and how the quoted WGS
definition reflects that intent.

If the above intent assumption is correct, then it seems to me that a
WGS label might mean that, for example:

	- section X.Y of the draft is stable and is unlikely
	  to change much soon (i.e. there is WG consensus that
	  WG should stop working on that section; it is good
	  enough for now)

	- the draft is ready for external review
	  (i.e., there is WG consensus that now is the good time
	  to get external review going; the WG expects to address
	  reviewer comments and not to make drastic changes to
	  the draft for some time, while the reviews are collected;
	  please review now!)

	- the draft is NOT ready for external review
	  (i.e., there is WG consensus that now is not a good
	  time to address most review comments, including that
	  nasty 10 page review from a prominent IESG member that
	  is trying to kill the draft; we are making many
	  changes, please try again later!)

	- the draft is ready for prototype implementation
	  (i.e., there is WG consensus that vendor should start
	  prototyping and provide WG with implementation feedback)

	- section Z of the draft is NOT ready for any implementations
	  (i.e., there is a WG consensus that any implementation
	  feedback for Z would be too early at this stage, including
	  those changes that vendor X demanded based on their early
	  experience with the Z portion of the protocol)

	- the draft status should be changed from standards-track
	  to informational (i.e., there is a WG consensus that
	  ideas on the draft are dead and are going to be
	  archived soon; the WG is waiting for an AD opinion; it
	  is unwise to prototype this idea now)

Thus, saying that a particular ID has a WGS label is not saying much.
The label only means that the WG was able to agree on something
related to [a portion of] the draft. This means that a draft may have
multiple WGS labels (or one compounded label) when the WG made several
statements about the same draft (e.g., ready for both review and
prototyping). One has to look somewhere (e.g., in the WGS draft) to
find the WG meaning attached to that particular WGS label. Is this
caveat already documented in the WGS draft?

Having this kind of WGS label as a part of a draft filename does not
seem like a good idea then: the label itself carries almost no
additional information!

Did I interpret the intended consequences of the WGS label definition
correctly?

Thank you,

Alex.

P.S. The draft gives conflicting instructions regarding the
     discussion venue (solutions versus newtrk).
.
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