Re: IESG voting procedures

[Keith Moore <moore@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks for that info.  That does make me feel a bit better.

Keith

On Aug 15, 2011, at 5:50 AM, Romascanu, Dan (Dan) wrote:

Hi Keith,

 

Ø  The only other formal level of review we have are the Last Call comments which, given the volume of documents that get Last Called, amounts to a fairly small and random chance that somebody outside the WG will happen to notice the proposed document action and give the document a thorough review.

 

I do not know whether to call these ‘formal’ but currently all documents that go to Last Call also undergo three expert reviews – Gen-ART, Sec-DIR and OPS-DIR. According to the scope of the documents a few more expert reviews may be called as required by the WG, shepherd or AD – APPS-Dir, TSV-Dir, MIB-Doctors, DNS-Dir, etc.

 

Regards,

 

Dan

 

 

 

From: ietf-bounces@xxxxxxxx [mailto:ietf-bounces@xxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Keith Moore
Sent: Monday, August 15, 2011 4:02 AM
To: Barry Leiba
Cc: adrian@xxxxxxxxxxxx; IETF
Subject: Re: IESG voting procedures

 

 

On Aug 14, 2011, at 8:40 PM, Barry Leiba wrote:

Convincing the entire IESG is a very high barrier, especially when

typically, most of the IESG just wants the issue to go away.    It might

happen for a significant architectural issue, perhaps, but not for an

area-specific technical flaw.

Here's the point: if an AD can't get at least one or two other ADs to
read the document and agree to join in the blocking, then that AD MUST
NOT be allowed to block the document.  That's even the case if the AD
thinks she's found a serious flaw.  Because if, out of 14 others in
the IESG, not ONE other is willing to read the document, understand
the issue, and agree on it.

 

That's also how I interpret the rules.  I just don't think that this is sufficient review.  I think that in practice it makes IESG more-or-less a rubber stamp for any issue that isn't easily fixed with small and often inconsequential changes to the document text.

 

The problem is, the ADs are very busy people, and their expertise has to cover a wide range of topics, so there will be few IESG members who can really understand a subtle issue.   Document reviews outside of one's subject area are very difficult and require considerable focus.   GIven that, even if only one AD catches a flaw in a document, there's a good chance (though not a certainty of course) that it's something that warrants more attention.   It's far more likely that no ADs will find the flaw because nobody really took the time to read the document thoroughly and to understand its implications of the document outside of the narrow subject area of the working group.

 

I understand (and agree with) the sentiment that, ultimately, one or two people shouldn't be able to block a document.  Nor do I want documents held up for trivialities as, unfortunately, sometimes happens.  But I've seen many cases where working groups failed to do an adequate level of review outside of their narrow areas of concern, and it appears that IESG's current rules and workload make it difficult for problems to get fixed after a document leaves the WG.   

 

(and people keep arguing to remove steps from our process so that there will be even less review after a document has progressed to Proposed...)

 

The only other formal level of review we have are the Last Call comments which, given the volume of documents that get Last Called, amounts to a fairly small and random chance that somebody outside the WG will happen to notice the proposed document action and give the document a thorough review.

 

To put the question another way:  What level of formal technical review, outside of a WG, best serves IETF's goals? 

 

Keith

 

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