Subject: [apps-discuss] A newcomer question

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 07 Jul 2012 02:31:10 -0700

Hi APPSAWG,

After reading the Tao, I am given to understand that I can approach 
you with a newcomer question.  The APPSAWG charter mentions that:

   "a core team of WG participants with sufficient energy and
    expertise to advance the proposed work item according to the
    proposed schedule"

as one of the factors in accepting new work.

Is there any informal description of how that "energy and expertise" 
might be assessed for future proposals?

What would be the proposed schedule for future proposals?

Are there any practices the APPSAWG working group follows for acknowledgements?

Regards,
-sm

---

From: "Murray S. Kucherawy" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 7 Jul 2012 20:40:17 -0700

On Sat, Jul 7, 2012 at 2:31 AM, SM <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Hi APPSAWG,
>
> After reading the Tao, I am given to understand that I can approach you
> with a newcomer question.

Hello SM, and welcome to the IETF!

>  The APPSAWG charter mentions that:
>
> Is there any informal description of how that "energy and expertise" might
> be assessed for future proposals?
>

We don't have a hard-and-fast rule.  It is typically left to the discretion
of working group chairs and the participants to determine whether that kind
of support for new work exists.

> What would be the proposed schedule for future proposals?

We're in the process of adopting a new plan to select a milestone for
completion of any new work APPSAWG takes on, as well as selecting such
milestones for existing documents.  This will be put in place soon,
possibly during the upcoming Vancouver meeting.

> Are there any practices the APPSAWG working group follows for

Are you referring here to Acknowledgements sections of RFCs, or something
else?

-MSK, APPSAWG co-chair

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2012 03:52:10 -0700

Hi Murray,
>Hello SM, and welcome to the IETF!

Thank you. :-)

>We don't have a hard-and-fast rule.  It is typically left to the 
>discretion of working group chairs and the participants to determine 
>whether that kind of support for new work exists.

I was looking at this in terms of energy and expertise instead of 
support for new work.

>We're in the process of adopting a new plan to select a milestone 
>for completion of any new work APPSAWG takes on, as well as 
>selecting such milestones for existing documents.  This will be put 
>in place soon, possibly during the upcoming Vancouver meeting.

As an example, one of the drafts being discussed took around six 
months from the initial adoption by APPSAWG to working group Last 
Call.  That's not a long time.  The participants in the discussion 
over the last months were:

   Andreas Petersson (one of the authors)
   Willy Tarreau
   Ben Niven-Jenkins
   Martin Thomson
   Julian Reschke (Applications Area Directorate)
   Alexey Melnikov (Working Group Chair)
   Stephen Farrell (Area Director)
   Barry Leiba (Area Director)
   Alissa Cooper (IAB member)

If I remove people with an IETF role from the above list (it's not a 
good measure) there are three individuals left.  My conclusion is 
that the draft would not be ready for a Last Call without the 
contribution of Willy Tarreau, Ben Niven-Jenkins and Martin Thomson.

>Are you referring here to Acknowledgements sections of RFCs, or 
>something else?

I was referring to the Acknowledgment section of RFCs.

Regards,
-sm

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 8 Jul 2012 12:20:44 -0400

> I was looking at this in terms of energy and expertise instead of support
> for new work.

There's no difference in the answer; I think Murray covered your question.

As an example, one of the drafts being discussed took around six months
> from the initial adoption by APPSAWG to working group Last Call.  That's
> not a long time.  The participants in the discussion over the last months
> were:
>
> If I remove people with an IETF role from the above list (it's not a good
> measure)

I very strongly disagree.  The fact that some people take on role of
leadership or responsibility doesn't mean that our work on documents
doesn't count.  You might reasonably say that Alexey, as chair, and I, as
responsible AD, performed ex oficio roles and not contributor roles, but
Julian, Stephen, Alissa, and Andreas were very much involved in the
document, and their work absolutely "counts" as we tally the contributions.
 I find it rather amazing that you would even suggest that just because
someone is on a directorate or the IAB, they don't get counted in a count
of energy and expertise involved in working on a document!

Further:

>  My conclusion is that the draft would not be ready for a Last Call
> without the contribution of Willy Tarreau, Ben Niven-Jenkins and Martin
> Thomson.

I think that's absolutely correct: those three individuals' contributions
were important to bringing the document to where it is.  That's not a
*problem*, but is exactly how the IETF works, and we're in a better
position for their contributions.

> I was referring to the Acknowledgment section of RFCs.

I don't see what you're asking here.  I don't think appsawg has any special
rules for acknowledgments that differ from anything done elsewhere in the
IETF, and i don't think it would be appropriate to have any.

Barry

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2012 10:22:08 -0700

> I was looking at this in terms of energy and expertise instead of

Permit me the cautious suggestion that the search isn't worth the 
effort.  The text isn't a specification and the process isn't mechanical.

The text attempts to give a basic sense of things and, I think, it does. 
  Beyond that, everything is subjective and approximate.

If some insists on more, we should just fall back to the practice of 
assessing rough consensus.

d/

-- 
  Dave Crocker
  Brandenburg InternetWorking
  bbiw.net

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2012 13:56:08 -0400

--On Sunday, July 08, 2012 12:20 -0400 Barry Leiba
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>...
>> If I remove people with an IETF role from the above list
>> (it's not a good measure)
> 
> 
> I very strongly disagree.  The fact that some people take on
> role of leadership or responsibility doesn't mean that our
> work on documents doesn't count.  You might reasonably say
> that Alexey, as chair, and I, as responsible AD, performed ex
> oficio roles and not contributor roles, but Julian, Stephen,
> Alissa, and Andreas were very much involved in the document,
> and their work absolutely "counts" as we tally the
> contributions.  I find it rather amazing that you would even
> suggest that just because someone is on a directorate or the
> IAB, they don't get counted in a count of energy and expertise
> involved in working on a document!

Let me try a different point of view.  The calculation SM is
trying to do does demonstrate one thing, which is almost
certainly true across the IETF and most (or all) other SDOs.
That is that, for a given document, the number of people
actually doing significant work is fairly small.  Certainly it
would be nice to change that although I have no idea how to do
it.  Certainly proposals for measures that optimize the time of
those people (i.e., not wasting any more of it than necessary)
should be taken seriously.  We should also be cautious that any
given effort does not suffer from a too-narrow perspective.
Beyond that, I don't see a problem that needs solving.

I don't want to go so far as to suggest that initiating this
discussion involves precisely the waste of time I suggest above
that we should avoid.  But I think we should recognize that risk.

best,
   john

---

From: Willy Tarreau <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 8 Jul 2012 20:06:56 +0200

Hi SM,

since I'm cited, let me tell you my point of view :-)

On Sun, Jul 08, 2012 at 03:52:10AM -0700, SM wrote:
> good measure) there are three individuals left.

It is an error to see it this way. People with an IETF role are even
more involved than other ones. Everyone participates with the amount
of time he/she can devote and depending on the perceived importance
of this participation.

> My conclusion is 

I disagree. The draft would be ready whatever the contributors. It
would just probably be slightly different. But most of the work always
comes from the author. The rest generally is just "fine tuning" and is
of much less importance.

> I was referring to the Acknowledgment section of RFCs.

I personally don't mind not being cited there considering that my
contribution was fairly limited here!

I think you should not take importance about this aspect. Many
contributors are happy once they can implement something well
designed and for most of us that's more important than being
acknowledged for this.

Regards,
Willy

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 8 Jul 2012 14:49:07 -0400

> actually doing significant work is fairly small.

Yes.  It also demonstrates another thing: that a significant group of
people get involved in many aspects of the organization, so we see people
with a number of roles, of which one is "contributor".  Both are things
that are common to most (or all) SDOs.

I see roughly three levels of involvement:
- Those who participate in very many aspects and very many work areas and
work items.
- Those who participate in one or a few focus areas, often being active in
many work items in those areas, but in little outside them.
- Those who are around for one or a few specific documents they're
interested in.

People sometimes shift from one of those groups to another, as their other
commitments and their interests allow.

We look at the first group as "the usual suspects", the "greybeards", or,
perhaps more skeptically, the "old boy network".  We think of the second
group as having some subject-matter experts.  But all three groups,
including the third, are important to the technology development process.

> We should also be cautious that any

Quite so, which is where Murray's answer comes in.

> Beyond that, I don't see a problem that needs solving.

Indeed.

> that we should avoid.  But I think we should recognize that risk.

Indeed........

Barry

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 08 Jul 2012 16:12:32 -0700

Hi All,
At 09:20 08-07-2012, Barry Leiba wrote:
>doesn't count.  You might reasonably say that Alexey, as chair, and 
>I, as responsible AD, performed ex oficio roles and not contributor 
>roles, but Julian, Stephen, Alissa, and Andreas were very much

The persons in roles of leadership or responsibility already know how 
the IETF works.  They already contribute as individuals to drafts in 
APPSAWG and in other working groups.  I am aware of the contributions 
of the chair and responsible AD.  They may have contributed even if 
they were not performing ex-officio roles.  That applies to Julian, 
Stephen and Alissa too.

>  involved in the document, and their work absolutely "counts" as we 
> tally the contributions.  I find it rather amazing that you would 
> even suggest that just because someone is on a directorate or the 

I was not tallying the contributions or what "counts".  More comments below.

>I think that's absolutely correct: those three individuals' 
>contributions were important to bringing the document to where it 
>is.  That's not a *problem*, but is exactly how the IETF works, and 
>we're in a better position for their contributions.

Yes.

>I don't see what you're asking here.  I don't think appsawg has any 
>special rules for acknowledgments that differ from anything done 
>elsewhere in the IETF, and i don't think it would be appropriate to have any.

I mentioned practices (not rules) ( 
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg06614.html 
).  As a newcomer it's difficult to figure out what the practices are.

>effort.  The text isn't a specification and the process isn't mechanical.

Yes.

>assessing rough consensus.

No, that was not the aim.  I was thinking of a message you sent to a 
mailing list about history when I wrote the message.

>actually doing significant work is fairly small.  Certainly it

Yes.

>Beyond that, I don't see a problem that needs solving.

I am not looking at all this as a problem.  Some things are nice to 
have but that's not going to happen.

If I had to look at all this, it would be "what could be done to make 
it easier for people bringing in such work".

>since I'm cited, let me tell you my point of view :-)

I appreciate the view as you took the time to explain it. :-)

At 11:49 08-07-2012, Barry Leiba wrote:
>matter experts.  But all three groups, including the third, are 
>important to the technology development process.

Yes.

Regards,
-sm