On 09-Sep-23 03:09, Stephen Farrell wrote:
Hiya,
I think this would likely turn out to be a modest improvement
over the status quo, so would be supportive.
However, I'd strongly encourage the IESG to instead consider
more radical change, with a view to tacking the role, load,
and difficulty in appointing, all ADs. For example, the IESG
might communicate to the 2024 nomcom that it desired incoming
ADs be selected who would have as their first priority doing
such a re-organisation of the IESG, even perhaps with odd
term durations (1 or 3 years, whatever). If the IESG already
tried to consider more radical change, but didn't find any
solution they liked, then please communicate that to the
community - my take from various discussions at IETF117
was that the community do want to see some such changes in
how the IETF is organised, and if the IESG can't see a way
to get there, then we should be considering some community
based process.
+1, but I would like to add from my experience of the 2005
IESG choosing not to adopt proposals from the newtrk WG that
the phrase "community based process" needs close attention.
Additional efforts at process reform in 2005/6 also failed.
Part of that failure was undoubtedly my fault (as General AD
at the time) but I think the underlying cause was the IESG's
difficulty in stepping back from the daily grind to look at
*itself* and the IETF process as a whole from the outside.
That was natural enough, because humans are very bad at
looking at themselves, especially when overloaded.
So the sequence
BOF->WG->(WG rough consensus)->AD->IESG->(IETF rough consensus)
simply didn't work then, and I'm not sure it would work now.
The fact that this process worked for administrative reform
is not relevant, because that didn't really require the sort
of self-examination that Stephen suggests.
So, we'd have to structure the process a bit differently
to get round this difficulty. I'm not quite sure how to do
that (as I wasn't in 2005).
Regards
Brian
Cheers,
S.
On 08/09/2023 15:44, Martin Duke wrote:
The IESG proposes to reorganize the areas by merging the web-related
working groups in ART with most of the transport area to create a new area
called either “Web and Application Transport” (WAT) or “Transport and Web
Applications” (TWA), effective at IETF 119. The IESG invites community
comment on this change.
The Transport area (TSV) is the smallest area in terms of working groups.
More importantly, it has been extremely difficult to find candidates for
the two Transport AD positions for many years. Although the Transport Area
could be managed by one AD, the IESG strongly feels that having a partner
is very important for vacation coverage, managing working groups, handling
conflicts of interest, and so on.
Meanwhile, the Applications and Real Time (ART) area has been growing. The
IESG has already requested a third AD position for ART to be seated by the
NomCom in 2024. One of these three ART ADs would move to the new area,
together with one AD from TSV. Concurrently eliminating a position prevents
growth in the overall size of the IESG.
Similar to the OPS area, this new area would have two centers of gravity
(transport layer and web applications), so that one AD would have transport
expertise and the other would have HTTP expertise. Thematically, this new
area would have cohesion around traditional Transport subjects and ART
protocols that are often used as transports (especially HTTP). These groups
tend to have significant attendance overlaps.
Affected Working Groups
The following working groups would move outside both ART and the new area:
-
ALTO to OPS
-
DTN to INT
-
IPPM to OPS
-
SCIM to SEC
-
TIGRESS to SEC
The new area would consist of the following working groups:
-
AVTCORE
-
CDNI
-
CCWG
-
CORE
-
HTTPAPI
-
HTTPBIS
-
MASQUE
-
MOQ
-
NFSV4
-
QUIC
-
RTCWEB
-
TAPS
-
TCPM
-
TSVAREA (to be renamed in accordance with the new area and an updated
description/purpose)
-
TSVWG (this may require a minor recharter, but would retain the same
competencies)
-
WEBTRANS
All other ART working groups would remain in place.
The Transport Area Review Team (TSVART) would not change its purpose,
scope, or operations. The Transport-focused AD would have primary
responsibility for managing this team. The HTTP Directorate would also
remain as-is and would be overseen by the HTTP-oriented AD of the new area.
Details about ARTART are TBD.
Transition Plan
The IESG would request that NomCom not fill the open TSV AD position
currently occupied by Martin Duke. Francesca Palombini and Zahed Sarker
would be the initial ADs for the new area.
The IESG would also request that one of the two ART openings be filled for
only a one-year term, so as to stagger future ART AD terms.
The new area’s AD terms would initially also end at the same time. In the
2024-2025 NomCom cycle, the IESG would request that the NomCom fill two
slots, one with transport expertise and one with HTTP expertise, either of
which could be a one-year term (but not both).
Next Steps
Please submit any comments on this plan, including the name/acronym to
iesg@xxxxxxxx no later than 20 Sep 2023 (anywhere on Earth).
Concurrently, the IESG will work on updated job descriptions to be
transmitted to the NomCom. It anticipates this update will be relatively
minor.
On Behalf of the IESG,
Martin Duke
Transport AD
