Subject: Re: [ntpwg] [ntp:hackers] Announcing the NTP Forum

From: Leif Johansson <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 01 Dec 2007 08:37:43 +0100

> Leif, did I answer your question in there?
>
> H
>   
Yes you did. May I suggest that you explain more clearly that what you
list next to the projects is total funding requirements, rather than "price
of admission". Perhaps I'm damaged by seeing how other fora and SDOs
present themselves but I thought I was looking at a very strange sort of
membership fee structure.

    Cheers Leif
_______________________________________________
ntpwg mailing list
[email-masked]
https://lists.ntp.org/mailman/listinfo/ntpwg

---

From: Harlan Stenn <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:49:58 +0000

> membership fee structure.

I understand - the membership levels are documented on the "Member
Benefits" page, which is the "Benefits" link on the main page.

You were looking at the Forum Projects page, which I have now updated.
Could I impose on you to see if you think the updated page is OK?

I'm also working on a "Why the NTP Forum is needed" page.

Thanks for your feedback...

H

---

From: "David L. Mills" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 01 Dec 2007 16:22:50 +0000

Harlan,

Over the years you and I have had very different views on many subjects, 
but have generally lived with them. The forum thing is another matter. 
This is a terribly bad idea. It appears to be a cross between a 
charitable organization and a lobby group and with no clear focus. There 
is no management plan, no schedule and no milestones. If you, and I mean 
you personally, are prepared to offer some service, either as sole 
principal or project manager, then propose the work to a funding agency, 
either private or government. That's the conventional approach and what 
most of us academic types have been doing for our adult lives.

There is of course the downside when proposals are not accepted, in 
which case a very real consideration is whether the work should be done 
in the first place. The NTP project is long of tooth, having been 
supported by both volunteers and gevernment for well over two decades. 
With the conclusion of the current RFC projects, the ongoing work is 
certainly sustainable via the current public lists and newsgroup. If 
there is further work to be done in the time area, it is probably better 
aimed at the new tictoc working group. Ongoing project support is 
probably more readily available in that venue.

Dave

---

From: Paul Vixie <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 01 Dec 2007 18:06:27 +0000

dave, i know that you have no reason to take my views on ntp seriously, since
for every million lines of code you have contributed to time protocols, i've
contributed about 0.5.  but if you will allow me to draw on my dns experience,
i have some observations i'd like to share.

> ... That's the conventional approach and what most of
> us academic types have been doing for our adult lives.

i know that "time protocols" was once a purely academic matter, and that there
is still some pure academic work to be done at the level of improving the
general understanding of the problem spaces, investigating new approaches,
measuring and improving current approaches, and so on.

but "time protocols" also has operational and business facets.  recurring
revenue and expense, with dedicated management and technology resources, and
designated responsible individuals, and "big-tent politics", must also appear
if "time protocols" is to be a viable ecosystem, and to be a vibrant part of
the larger "internet ecosystem".

(all of which is true of "domain name protocols" which is why i claim to have
some wisdom to share on this general topic.)

i've seen that some of your investigations over the last few decades have used
your "reference implementation" as an experimental test bed.  you're a real
engineer as well as a real scientist, and you aren't satisfied with proofs of
correctness, simulations, or whiteboard exercises.  many of us are happy
running code with features that may or may not appear in an RFC some day.

however, the internet is far larger than academia or even geekdom, and to
support "time protocols" in this larger non-academic context, it's necessary
to reach beyond the protocol development, advanced development, open source,
and academic communities, and to reach out to the business, security,
operations, government, and legal communities.

because of harlan's dual relationship to both udel and the ntp forum, this is
not a code-fork event.  it's our hope that there will always be a reference
implementation whose technical correctness has [email-masked] as its final and
absolute judge.  but since there are opportunities and obligations in "time
protocols" that go beyond udel's interests, we're creating an ntp forum as a
vehicle to address those opportunities and obligations.

[email-masked] will always be "father time" to us.  i say this not only as the
one time operator of clepsydra.dec.com, but also as president of isc whereat
the ntp forum secretariat is presently housed.

paul