Under the Nominations Committee procedures defined in RFC 3777, the IESG is responsible for providing a summary of the expertise desired of the candidates selected for open IESG positions. This information is included below, and is suitable for publication to the community, along with the Nomination Committee's request for nominations. We realize that this is a long list of demanding qualifications, and that no one person will be able meet all of the requirements for a specific position. We trust that the NomCom will weigh all of these qualifications and choose IESG members who represent the best possible balance of these qualifications. Generic Requirements: IESG members are the managers of the IETF standards process. This means that they must understand the way the IETF works, be good at working with other people, be able to inspire and encourage other people to work together on a volunteer basis, and have sound technical judgment about IETF technology and its relationship to technology developed elsewhere. ADs select and directly manage the WG chairs, so IESG members should possess sufficient interpersonal and management skills to manage ~15-30 part-time people. Most ADs are also responsible for one or more directorates or review teams. So the ability to identify good leaders and technical experts and recruit them for IETF work is required. Having been a WG chair helps in understanding the WG chair role, and will help in resolving problems and issues that a WG chair may have. In addition, all IESG members should have strong technical expertise that crosses two or three IETF areas. Ideally, an IESG member would have made significant technical contributions in more than one IETF area, preferably authoring documents and/or chairing WGs in more than one area. IESG members are expected to make sure that every document coming before the IESG is properly reviewed. Although IESG members may delegate the actual review to individuals or review teams, the IESG members will need to understand and represent the reviewers' objections or comments. So the ability and willingness to read and understand complex information quickly is another important attribute in an IESG member. (Note that this does not mean that every AD must review every draft personally - but they must be satisified that adequate review has taken place.) It is helpful for an IESG member to have a good working knowledge of the IETF document process and WG creation and chartering process. This knowledge is most likely to be found in experienced IETF WG chairs, but may also be found in authors of multiple documents. IESG members must also have strong verbal and written communications skills and a proven track record of leading and contributing to the consensus of diverse groups. A few comments on the IESG role: Serving on the IESG requires a substantial time commitment. The basic IESG activities consume between 25 and 40 hours per week (varying by area and by month, with the most time required immediately before IETF meetings). Most IESG members also participate in additional IETF leadership activities, further increasing the time commitment for those individuals. Even if they do not occupy formal liaison positions, ADs may also need to interact with external bodies such as other standards organizations, which may require travel. It is also imperative that IESG members attend all IETF meetings and up to two additional IESG retreats per year. Because of the large time and travel commitments, employer support for a full two year stint is essential for an IESG member. Because of personal impact including awkwardly timed conference calls, an IESG member's family must also be supportive. ----------------------------------------------- Applications Area: The Applications Area focuses on applications that run across the Internet and require some sort of standardized infrastructure to be effective. This includes, but is not limited to: E-Mail, Web protocols, Directory services, printing services and NetNews. The Applications area often discusses whether something is properly the realm of the IETF or "belongs" to other organizations. Because of this, and Applications AD needs to be willing and able to relate to a wide range of non-IETF organizations. An Applications AD also needs to be someone that we can trust to make these critical decisions about the scope of the IETF's work. Because of the breadth of the Applications area, an Application AD will have to deal with a large set of Internet applications protocols, including many with which he or she may not have direct experience. So, an Applications AD needs to be good at evaluating new approaches to new problems and assessing the expertise of the people who bring them to the IETF Because the set of people in the Applications Area changes with the protocols currently under development, the ability to clearly explain how the IETF works, and to help new WGs work well within the IETF framework is also important. The Applications Area most often intersects with, and sometimes swaps working groups or work items with, the Security Area (for application-level security, or applications where security is an important aspect) and the Transport Area (for issues with congestion in applications), so cross-area expertise in either of these areas would be particularly useful. ----------------------------------------------- Internet Area: The primary technical areas covered by the Internet area include: IP(v4 & v6), Layer 2 and 3 VPNs and related MPLS issues, DNS, Host and Router Configuration, Mobility, DHCP, Network Access Control and various link-layer technologies. The Internet Area is responsible for specifying how IP will run over new link layer protocols as they are defined. Between them, the Internet ADs are expected to have a solid understanding of the above, also including MTU and fragmentation related issues, various types of IP addressing, IP forwarding and IP tunneling. The Internet area has one of the broadest ranges of technical topics. It has been typical of the Internet area to have its two Area Directors divide the topics they specialize in, because it is too much to expect that both ADs will have a very strong command of all topics in the Area. To assist them, there are active Mobility and DNS directorates to draw upon. However, the NomCom should consider the skills of the sitting Internet Area Director and look for technical balance with even more care than in other areas. The Internet area intersects most frequently with the Routing Area (particularly for IP Forwarding, Multicast and MPLS), the Operations & Management Area (for MIB development & Link-layer security mechanisms (AAA/RADIUS)) and the Security Area (for IPsec and IKE). So, cross-area expertise in any of those areas would be particularly useful. ----------------------------------------------- Operations & Management Area: The primary technical areas covered by the Operations & Management area include: Network Management, AAA, and various operational issues facing the Internet such as DNS operations, IPv6 operations, Routing operations. Unlike most IETF areas, the Operations & Management area is logically divided into two separate functions: Network Management and Operations. Bert Wijnen is responsible for the Network Management portion of the OPS area, so specific expertise required for the 2005 open position would include a strong understanding of Internet management, including but not limited to SNMP, SMI and Netconf. The Network Management AD is largely responsible for development and direction of Network Management protocols like SNMP, SMI, NetConf, CAPWAP etc. Another important role of the Network Management AD is to identify potential or actual management issues regarding IETF protocols and documents in all areas, and to work with the other areas to resolve those issues. This requires a strong understanding of how new and updated protocols may be monitored and configured. It also requires a strong cross-area understanding of IETF protocol architecture and technologies. The Network Management portion of the OPS area intersects with all areas, specifically in reviewing and assisting with MIB documents. Thus, cross-area expertise in any area would be useful. Security of network management is a particularly current topic. ----------------------------------------------- Real-time Applications and Infrastructure Area: The Real-Time Applications and Infrastructure Area develops protocols and architectures for delay-sensitive interpersonal communications Work in this area serves an industry whose applications and services include voice and video over IP, instant messaging and presence. These applications and services are "real-time" in the sense set out in RFC 1889. The RAI Area is seeded with existing working groups from the Transport and Applications Area: SIP, SIPPING, XCON, SIMPLE, GEOPRIV, ECRIT, ENUM, IPTEL, MEGACO, MMUSIC, IEPREP, SPEECHSC, AVT, and SIGTRAN. A good rule of thumb for the incorporation of new work into RAI, as opposed to Transport or Applications, is that the work in question is needed to support real-time interpersonal communication. The infrastructure applications needed to support such communications are explicitly in scope, as are discussions of operational concerns specific to this area. For example, work might relate to presence services, to session signaling protocols and emergency call routing solutions, or to work on the "layer five" issues for Internet telephony. Like all areas of the IETF, the RAI Area draws on the work of numerous other areas, and as such there can be no neat mathematical boundaries delineating RAI's work from the rest of the IETF. The new area will allow an existing community within the IETF to solidify its vision and to benefit from increased institutional support. ----------------------------------------------- Routing Area: The Routing Area is responsible for ensuring continuous operational status of the Internet routing system by maintaining the scalability and stability characteristics of the existing routing protocols, as well as developing new protocols, extensions, and bug fixes in a timely manner. In particular, forwarding methods (such as destination-based unicast and multicast forwarding, and MPLS), as well as associated routing and signalling protocols (e.g., OSPF, IS-IS, BGP, RSVP-TE, PIM) are within the scope of the Routing Area. The Area also works on Generalized MPLS used in the control plane of optical networks and on security aspects of the routing system. A Routing AD is required to have solid knowledge of the Internet routing system and its operations and must be proficient in at least one of the mainstream routing protocols/technologies such as BGP, OSPF, IS-IS, MPLS, GMPLS, or multicast. Implementation and deployment experience, as well as significant contributions to the WGs in the area are highly desirable. The Routing area intersects most frequently with the Internet Area (particularly for IP Forwarding and Multicast), the Operations & Management Area (for MIB development) and the Security Area (for Routing Protocol security). So, cross-area expertise in any of those areas would be particularly useful. ----------------------------------------------- Security Area: The WGs within the Security Area are primarily focused on security protocols. They provide one or more of the security services: integrity, authentication, non-repudiation, confidentiality, and access control. Since many of the security mechanisms needed to provide these security services are cryptographic, key management is also vital. Security ADs are expected to ensure that all IETF specifications are reviewed for adequate security coverage. They also manage a set of security resources that are available to most IETF areas and WGs. Specific expertise required for a Security AD would include a strong knowledge of IETF security protocols, particularly IPsec, IKE, and TLS, and a good working knowledge of security protocols and mechanisms that have been developed inside and outside the IETF, most notably including PKI. Also, a Security AD should understand how to weigh the security requirements of a protocol against operational and implementation requirements. We must be pragmatic; otherwise people will not implement and deploy the secure protocols that the IETF standardizes. The Security Area intersects with all other IETF areas, and its ADs are expected to read and understand the security implications of documents in all areas. So, broad knowledge of IETF technologies and the ability to assimilate new information quickly are imperative for a Security AD. ----------------------------------------------- Transport Area: The technical areas covered by the Transport area are those with data transport goals or with transport design issues and impact on congestion in Internet. To illustrate the latter: the Pseudowire Emulation Edge to Edge working group (PWE3) was initially in Transport until the architecture was developed, and then moved to the Internet area. The major topics in Transport are protocols (TCP, UDP, SCTP, DCCP), congestion control, multicast transports, QOS and reservation signaling, performance metrics, NAT regularization, NFS, and Internet storage. Transport is considering future work in generalized forward error correction, overlay multicast, very high bandwidth traffic, and peer to peer protocol transport. A Transport AD should have a good understanding of congestion control, flow control, real-time transport protocols and other transport-level issues that affect application layer protocols. These basic transport skills should also be augmented by strong interest and skills in such issues as NAT and identity. The Transport area intersects most frequently with Internet Area, the Applications Area, the RAI Area, and the Security Area. So, cross-area expertise in any of those areas would be particularly useful. The Transport area has a strong management tradition. Although the technical areas are many, a Transport Area Director should have not just technical skills but also strong management and communication skills. Two of the critical skills that the Area values especially: o Guiding working groups to follow their charters closely o Nurturing new talent for the area's leadership _______________________________________________ IETF-Announce@ietf.org https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf-announce
