Speaking only as a Gen-ART reviewer, what Russ said is how I think it works,
and Ted's concern that I might be privileged as a Gen-ART reviewer at last
call time is the reason we're having that conversation.
Gen-ART reviewers have had that concern since we were writing reviews for
Harald. We don't WANT to be privileged, and we've worked consistently to
head that off.
I provided this text that's in the Gen-ART FAQ: 'And always remember that
the IESG ballot position is called "DISCUSS", not "IMPERIAL EDICT" or
"BLACKMAIL"'.
This should be doubly so, when a review team reviewer raised a concern.
Thanks,
Spencer
From: "Russ Housley" <housley(_at_)vigilsec(_dot_)com>
Ted:
I really disagree. Gen-ART Reviews begin this way:
I have been selected as the General Area Review Team (Gen-ART)
reviewer for this draft (for background on Gen-ART, please see
_http://www.alvestrand.no/ietf/gen/art/gen-art-FAQ.html_).
Please resolve these comments along with any other Last Call
comments
you may receive.
This tells the recipients that the review fits exactly the role you
describe above.
But your behavior does not tell the recipient that. If they were
being treated as general Last Call comments, it would be up to
the shepherd and sponsoring AD to resolve them, not up to
the General Area AD. That leaves one set of people on the hook
for making sure they are done and deciding when they are,
and it is the same set no matter how the Last Call comment
is generated. Your mechanism privileges one set
over others (in that they are more likely to be held as blocking
until resolved), is likely to be slower (since yet another busy person
must be informed that something is resolved, and may miss it
when it was), and does not encourage things to push earlier than
Last Call (which is the opportunity I think you're missing).
I disagree with this characterization.
IETF Last Call (hopefully) generates comments. These are usually
resolved before IESG Evaluation, which is what you advocate in your
note. This is the normal case in my experience. The issue seems to
come up when they are not resolved. As I said in my previous note,
there are two cases.
(1) The Gen-ART Review or other Last Call comments were ignored. If
someone takes the time to review the document at Last Call, they
deserve the respect of a response. Failure to respond is a
procedural objection. This is usually handled by the PROTO Shepherd,
WG Chair, or document author. If by the time the document reaches
IESG Evaluation, I have put a DISCUSS on documents to ensure that a
response does happen. (I did not say that the comments are accepted;
I said that a response is provided.) I have entered DISCUSS
positions like this for Gen-ART Reviews, SecDir Reviews, and reviews
from individual IETF participants. I've been careful to say that the
authors do not need to accept all of the comments, but then need to
answer them.
(2) I agree with one or more concerns raised in the Last Call
comments that was not resolved. Thus, a very often a very small
portion of last Call comments become blocking comments. I tend to
break the unresolved review comments into DISCUSS and COMMENT, giving
credit to the source of the review. (I'm not trying to take credit
for someone else's work.) AD judgement is needed here, and I
consider the DISCUSS Criteria in making that judgement.
Russ
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