Harald,
I had not submitted a WG-named draft close to the deadline for
some time, and obviously didn't notice earlier versions of the
"chair approval even a week further in advance" announcement. I
apologize for assuming it was a new problem and, hence, for
assuming that it occurred after the discussions around "July 14"
had been concluded.
At the same time, it appears to me that
* The community was never asked to review or approve
this change and that, had it been asked, alternative
mechanisms (such as "the WG Chair actually submits")
might have been suggested that would have permitted
shortening the schedule without placing additional
burdens on the Secretariat. In that context, it would
seem to me that a combined "either the WG chair must
approve several days in advance or must actually submit
the document itself by the deadline" rule might serve to
balance the "short time" problem with the "chairs
sometimes travel" one.
* Similarly, the community has never been asked to
review, or make suggestions about, the model/mechanism
for WG Chair "approval". While I don't think that is
procedurally necessary, there are a lot of very smart
people around the IETF, and a few of them aren't on the
IESG or in the secretariat. It seems sensible to take
advantage of that resource. It is interesting to me that
at least two new suggestions have emerged in the circa
48 hours since I posted my "rant": one to permit the WG
Chairs to make the submission themselves, at least if it
was clear that they were "authorizing" the document by
doing so rather than "approving" it, and one (as I
understand it) to actually create a placeholder
document, rather than merely a note to the Secretariat.
* even if only on an exception basis, the very short
interval between IETF60 and IETF61 (three months
--actually 13 weeks-- including a time when lengthy
vacations are common in many parts of the world)
probably should have resulted in a review and procedure
as to whether the extra week was too intrusive in this
case. I suspect it wasn't specifically on anyone's task
list to notice, perform such a review, and ask the
appropriate questions.
Colin has raised several other issues that also, IMO, deserve
careful consideration (which you have been giving them).
So I think that, if nothing else, there are several lessons in
this going forward.
And, incidentally, some of those lessons may be about the
"Admin" process and what expectations we should have of it.
Noting the observation about task lists above, I'm not at all
sure we should want to add careful and proactive tracking of
this sort of thing to the IESG's workload, but it seems obvious
(at least in retrospect) that it would be useful if it were done
by someone.
best,
john
--On Wednesday, 20 October, 2004 08:23 +0200 Harald Tveit
Alvestrand <harald@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> John,
>
> --On mandag, oktober 18, 2004 09:02:00 -0400 John C Klensin
> <john-ietf@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> Over the last few IETF meetings, processing has become more
>> automated, or the Secretariat has become more efficient in
>> other ways. The typical time to get an I-D posted other than
>> in the pre- and post-meeting rush has dropped to one working
>> day and has sometimes even been less. And, during the rush,
>> the queue has often cleared early enough that consideration
>> of shortening the deadlines/ lead time would be in order.
>>
>> Instead, a new rule has apparently crept into the posting
>> deadlines, with no community discussion or announcement other
>> than in those deadline announcements. The rule, in this
>> meeting's form, is that
>>
>> "As always, all initial submissions (-00) with a
>> filename beginning with "draft-ietf" must be approved by
>> the appropriate WG Chair before they can be processed or
>> announced. WG Chair approval must be received by
>> Monday, October 11 at 9:00 AM ET."
>
> as far as I can tell, this offset (different dates for -00
> draft submission and WG chair approval) was first introduced
> into the I-D deadline announcement for the Vienna IETF meeting
> - summer 2003:
>
>> NOTE: There are two (2) Internet-Draft Cutoff dates
>>
>> June 23rd: Cutoff for Initial Submissions (new documents)
>>
>> All initial submissions(-00) must be submitted by Monday,
>> June 23rd, at 09:00 ET. Initial submissions received after
>> this time will NOT be made available in the Internet-Drafts
>> directory, and will have to be resubmitted.
>>
>>
>> As before, all initial submissions (-00.txt) with a filename
>> beginning with a draft-ietf MUST be approved by the
>> appropriate WG Chair prior to processing and announcing. WG
>> Chair approval must be received by Monday, June 16th.
>
> At the time of Salt Lake City (Nov 2001), which is the
> earliest announcement I have a copy of, the date for WG chair
> approval was 3 days after the deadline; when the deadline for
> submission was moved from Friday to Monday, the WG chair
> approval deadline did not move.
>
> I'm still trying to figure out exactly what discussion
> happened ahead of the 2003 change, and how the WG chairs were
> informed.
>
> Harald
>
>
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