Subject: [Tools-team] indication of internet-draft status

From: stanislav shalunov <[email-masked]>
Date: 02 Mar 2005 13:44:11 -0500

As discussed on the call today, here's a draft of a message to be sent
to the general IETF list.

To: [email-masked]
CC: [email-masked]

Context: The IETF Tools team works on requirements for various
automated tools for the IETF.  Many of the tools have to deal with
internet-drafts; in these cases, the information whether an
internet-draft is a working group draft or a personal draft is
important.  The mechanism by which such information is kept thus needs
to be known to the tools and, correspondingly, reflected in the
requirements.

There appear to be three ways of keeping the information about
internet-draft status:

1. Internet-draft name: working group internet-drafts are called
   "draft-ietf-*", while personal drafts do not match this pattern.
   For a working group internet-draft, the third component of the file
   name is the working group abbreviation.  When a personal
   internet-draft becomes a working group item, or when a working
   group item is no longer one, or when an internet-draft changes the
   working group, the internet-draft gets republished under a new
   name.

2. Metadata kept separately: the file name has nothing to do with the
   status, which is kept separately.  The file name is stable and
   never changes (other than the version number).  The working group
   status is prominently indicated by all tools (in announcement
   subject lines, etc.).

3. Current situation: technically, (2) (however, name stability isn't
   enforced or actively encouraged).  Informally, (1) for most working
   groups.  Many (most?) participants infer (1).  Tools penalize
   non-"draft-ietf-*" working group internet-drafts by making their
   working group status less prominent.

For the purposes of specifying the requirements for tool development,
it is necessary to know which way to keep the information.  It is
rather obvious that (1) and (2) are both vastly preferable to (3).
The choice between (1) and (2) is less clear.

Advantages of (1):

* simpler;

* matches existing expectations of most participants;

* makes working group status automatically prominent.

Advantages of (2):

* cleaner;

* allows to track document history better and easier.

It appear that the Tools team has a slight preference of (1) in favor
of (2) because of the existing convention (but (2) perfectly workable;
it would simply require a bit of an education effort).  However, (3)
appears so much inferior to either (1) or (2) that proponents of (1)
and (2) would both be reasonably expected to be willing to compromise
so that (3) is avoided.

What is the way to keeping the status that the Tools team should use
in the requirements for the tools?

-- 
Stanislav Shalunov		http://www.internet2.edu/~shalunov/

This message is designed to be viewed upside down.

_______________________________________________
Tools-team mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/tools-team

---

From: Henrik Levkowetz <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 02 Mar 2005 20:11:04 +0100

Looks pretty good to me. Suggestions inline.

	Henrik

> to the general IETF list.

Probably better:
 CC: [email-masked]

> There appear to be three ways of keeping the information about

s/three ways/at least three conceivable ways/

>    working group, the internet-draft gets republished under a new

First line above:
s/are called/are strictly named/

Last line:
s/name./name, without exemption. (This could be automated, which would
also ensure that the meta-information of which new draft replaces the
previous one would be consistently and reliably captured)/

> * allows to track document history better and easier.

s/allows to track/allows tracking of/

> and (2) would both be reasonably expected to be willing to compromise

s/but (2) perfectly/but (2) is perfectly/

> in the requirements for the tools?

Maybe rather:

 With this we would like to raise the question of which way of keeping 
 the status the Tools team should use in the requirements for the tools
 it is specifying ?

---

From: stanislav shalunov <[email-masked]>
Date: 02 Mar 2005 14:27:33 -0500

> Looks pretty good to me. Suggestions inline.

New version with suggestions included for easier reading:

To: [email-masked]

There appear to be at least three conceivable ways of keeping the
information about internet-draft status:

1. Internet-draft name: working group internet-drafts are always named
   "draft-ietf-*", while personal drafts do not match this pattern.
   For a working group internet-draft, the third component of the file
   name is the working group abbreviation.  When a personal
   internet-draft becomes a working group item, or when a working
   group item is no longer one, or when an internet-draft changes the
   working group, the internet-draft gets republished under a new
   name, without exception.  (This could be automated in a way that
   would ensure that name history is consistently and reliably
   captured.)

Advantages of (1):

* simpler;

Advantages of (2):

* cleaner;

* allows tracking of document history better and easier.

It appears that the Tools team has a slight preference of (1) in favor
of (2) because of the existing convention (but (2) is perfectly
workable; it would simply require a bit of an education effort).
However, (3) appears so much inferior to either (1) or (2) that
proponents of (1) and (2) would both be reasonably expected to be
willing to compromise so that (3) is avoided.

With this in mind, we would like to raise the question: Which way of
keeping the status the Tools team should use in the requirements for
the tools it is specifying?

Sex is the mathematics urge sublimated.                 -- M. C. Reed.