g'day,
Lloyd Wood wrote:
Well, look at the list of signatories to the Draft in question.
technical merits, please.
I was not arguing for the merits of the technology in question based upon who
signed it. In fact, I haven't tried to address the technical merits of the
specific document at all. I was addressing the issue that Keith was declaring
a technique (IP address interception) as out of scope for the IETF and was,
in doing so, cutting the IETF off from an area of work that finds widespread
application on the net. This seemed inappropriate considering the claims for
the organization in such places as:
<http://www.ietf.org/tao.html#What_Is_IETF>
Note in particular the claims " It is the principal body engaged in the
development of new Internet standard specifications" and "Its mission
includes: ... Providing a forum for the exchange of information within the
Internet community between vendors, users, researchers, agency contractors
and network managers."
IP address interception is a widely used technique that would not be
developed or documented through the IETF if Keith had his way. Since it is a
widely used technique for vendors and network managers, we'd have to ask Gary
Malkin to revise his document if we agree to Keith's request.
To be explicit, this is a metadiscussion about the IETF. I specifically
disclaim any interest or standing in a debate about NECP itself.
Frankly, I hope we are going to be able to arrest this dangerous
trend. So, I engaged last year when I saw the broadcast industry
being run out of town over the TV: URL draft
whose technical content I recall as being a few lines of incorrect
EBNF notation that didn't parse. But hey, they were generating a _lot_
of signatories with their write-in campaign.
Again, I did not engage in a debate about the technical merits of their
claims, I was (and am) pointing out that the IETF claims to be a gathering
place to educate and exchange ideas and is not as good at that as it used to
be (IMHO).
Yes, and those of us who object to this degradation of the original
concept of the IETF
I'd like a reference for the original concept of the IETF, please; I
worry about history being rewritten. What was the original concept of
'RFC Editor', exactly?
I'm away from my archives, and my history only goes back about 10 years, so
I'll leave that for others who were there, but I refer you again to the Tao
of the IETF.
To me the appropriate reponse when someone sees danger in a technology
is another document, making your case.
...which is why Keith began this thread in the first place. Or don't
mailing list posts count as documents?
Well, that's not the way I read his initial messages. He basically said "I
tried to stop them at the drafting stage, but couldn't so I ask that we not
let this go out the door with our name on it".
Originally the response to an RFC you disagreed with was an RFC explaining
the problems you perceive. It is true that things have become more formal
over time, but nowhere is it carved in stone tablets that we can't identify
problems with current trends and make some adjustments to our processes.
That's not a call for less peer review. It's a call for less of a single
world view, and more tolerance for multiple world views. In effect, I'd also
rather we worry more about what technical people do with our documents and
less with what marketing people do with our documents.
Note, nobody talks in terms of getting something "blessed by the
IETF", but in terms of how the IETF would slow the work down and get
in the way so shouldn't be a part of the process.
Peer review slows things down. This is unavoidable in exposing the
work to a larger audience, but has long-term societal benefits
unfortunately not quantifiable on a balance sheet.
I guess I didn't explain that very well. The question was not whether the
work would be submited to peer review, but whether the IETF was an
appropriate forum for that peer review. The view I've heard expressed several
times has been that the IETF has ossified and would not be receptive to new
ideas so just slowed things down. The implication being that the IETF was no
longer relevant to the engineering process. You are not going to hear this
opinion expressed here from people who have already moved on, so I thought
I'd pass it on.
Note, I am *not* suggesting Cisco has abandoned the IETF. Heck, such a
decision would be so way out of my pay grade (and not the way I see this
company working at all). I'm just suggesting that at least some individuals
I know (and not just at Cisco) are starting to feel that the IETF is less
relevant to their needs than it used to be. Some people are going to say
"great, that'll cut down on the marketing BS".. I happen to say "Houston, we
have a problem here..."
-
peterd
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Peter Deutsch work email: pdeutsch(_at_)cisco(_dot_)com
Technical Leader
Content Services Business Unit private:
pdeutsch(_at_)earthlink(_dot_)net
Cisco Systems or : peterd(_at_)the(_dot_)web
Alcohol and calculus don't mix. Never drink and derive.
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