If a working group is chartered, starts down a path, and then later the IESG or IAB determine that the working group has overlooked a serious architectural problem, then the IAB or IESG needs to raise the issue when they find it. Declaring that "it is too late" in response to a real problem seem to be the wrong response.
Yours,
Joel M. Halpern
At 07:19 AM 11/21/2002 -0800, Charlie Perkins wrote:
Hello folks, I realzed that my proposal probably wasn't clearly enough stated, so here goes again. It is my belief that the IESG has formulated some architectural principles and applied them at inappropriate times in the process of standardizing a working group protocol specification. Right now, there is nothing preventing such a thing from happening even after working group Last Call, and nothing that assures that one AD's architecture principal is shared by the rest of the IESG or the IAB. This leads to what could be perceived as arbitrary restriction based on somebody's pet peeve -- whether or not the perception is true. I think that such architectural principles (e.g., suitability of vendor-specific extensions, but there are a number of others) should be formulated by the IAB. I think the IESG should try to understand early in the process whether a working group is violating an architectural principle, and when some candidate proposal seems to be in violation, that the IESG should get the IAB's opinion in writing. That opinion should be subjected to normal IETF process and published as a standards track document which can be cited as a normative reference. Again, as I stated last night, nothing is black and white, and I do not claim that we need IAB statements on every aspect of protocol design. But there have been some major upsets lately, and that is even less appropriate. There has to be a happier medium. Regards, Charlie P.