The IESG is considering publication of the attached IESG Statement on IETF activities that are overtaken by events (OBE). Please review and comment. The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and solicits final comments on this action. Please send substantive comments to the ietf@ietf.org mailing lists by 2009-02-11. Exceptionally, comments may be sent to iesg@ietf.org instead. The IESG ========== 1. Introduction IETF activities can be overtaken by events (OBE). For example, assume that a Working Group is chartered to address a particular problem. While the working group is developing its solution to the problem, one of the following events occur: - unrelated technologies evolve, causing the problem to cease to exist - unrelated technologies evolve, significantly decreasing the magnitude of the problem In these cases, the WG is OBE. Its output no longer merits the investment that it requires. Therefore, the WG should be rechartered or terminated. A WG can also be OBE if the community agrees that it should never have been chartered for any of the following reasons: - it addresses an ill-defined problem - it addresses a non-problem - it address a problem to which all solutions are worse than the problem This memo describes several measures that ADs can take to prevent WGs from becoming OBE. It also describes several measures that can be taken in the unhappy event that the IESG is presented with the output of a WG that has been OBE. 2. Preventative Measures 2.1 Prudent Chartering Avoid charters that run longer than one or two years. When faced with multi-year efforts, break the task into smaller pieces that can be achieved in one-or-two year increments. 2.2 Frequent Charter Review Use re-chartering exercises to re-evaluate the problem that a WG is addressing. Do not recharter a WG to work on a problem that is OBE. 3. IESG Actions The worst outcome for a WG that is OBE is for that WG to continue its work and send its output to the IESG for publication. When that happens, the IESG must choose among the following options: - publish with the status proposed by the WG - negotiate the document status with the WG and then publish - reject the document. If the IESG publishes the document unchanged, it may adversely impact the overall quality of the RFC series. If it rejects the document, it violates its charter with the WG. The IESG MUST NOT publish the output of WG that has been OBE as PS, BCP or EXPERIMENTAL. Publishing under those headers would imply that the IETF proposes deployment of those solutions/experiments, which it clearly does not. The IESG MAY publish the output of a WG that has been OBE as INFORMATIONAL or HISTORIC. It should add an IESG note stating that the problem addressed by the document has been OBE. The IESG MUST NOT reject a document simply because it has been OBE. It must consider publication as INFORMATIONAL or HISTORIC. _______________________________________________ IETF-Announce@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf-announce
