Re: call for ideas: tail-heavy IETF process

I initially replied to address Keith's comment. But a few things on Joe's:

On 5/15/13 7:41 AM, Keith Moore wrote:
> On 05/15/2013 10:39 AM, Joe Touch wrote:
> > On 5/14/2013 9:54 PM, Keith Moore wrote:
> > > Publishing broken or unclear documents is not progress.
> > Broken, agreed.
> >
> > Unclear, nope - please review the NON-DISCUSS criteria, notably:
> >
> > The motivation for a particular feature of a protocol is not clear 
> > enough. At the IESG review stage, protocols should not be blocked 
> > because they provide capabilities beyond what seems necessary to 
> > acquit their responsibilities.
> > The DISCUSS isn't there to make documents "better" - that's for COMMENTs.
Exactly right. Sometimes we forget; it's a good thing to remind us.

> > A DISCUSS there to catch a set of problems and to *block* the 
> > document's progress until that problem is resolved.
Mostly correct. However:

- If there is only one AD who wishes to DISCUSS and no other AD agrees 
with the DISCUSS holder, at the next telechat the document is unblocked. 
(See <http://www.ietf.org/iesg/voting-procedures.html>.)
- Even if others agree with the DISCUSS, the chair can be asked to use 
the alternate procedure, which requires 2/3 of non-recused ADs to agree 
to publication.
Which is to say, if there is only a single AD "blocking" a document, 
that block is essentially a 2 week affair if you are willing to push the 
point. No need for negotiating; if the WG decides that the AD is totally 
off base, tell your sponsoring AD that you're waiting the two weeks. 
People (unfortunately IMO) don't push the point nearly enough.
(For the record, the IESG has *never* used the latter of the two 
procedures.)
That said, I am also of the view that there is a third way, but I have 
never seen a WG attempt it:
DISCUSS should in fact require discussing. Assuming there was some good 
faith effort on the part of the WG to figure out what the AD was on 
about and they really assess that the AD has it wrong, a WG could say, 
"Sorry, we got this right. You are confused (or wrong). We are not 
changing the document. We are done discussing." At that point, I am of 
the opinion that the AD cannot hold the DISCUSS any longer. The AD must 
move to ABSTAIN. The discussion is, for all intents and purposes, over 
and to continue to DISCUSS is (IMO) an appealable offense. Then it is a 
matter of the IESG deciding whether there are enough ADs supporting the 
document (YES or NO OBJECTION) to count as consensus of the IESG. We 
ostensibly use 2/3 of non-recused ADs to mean "consensus", since (I 
think the theory goes) if you can't get 2/3 of ADs to agree that it's OK 
to publish a document, that is a sign of a lack of rough consensus in 
the IETF (and probably a serious problem in WG operation). Indeed, if 
the ADs are so off of their rockers that more than 1/3 of them are 
against a perfectly reasonable document, it's time for the appeals and 
recall procedures to be used.
(This is, BTW, where I disagree with Dave Crocker: Yes, a DISCUSS can be 
used as an exercise in authority, but only if it is allowed to be an 
"assertion that changes are being required". If the rest of the IETF 
started saying, "Sorry, no change is going to be made" instead of making 
changes simply to satisfy the AD, we'd actually be better off and the 
DISCUSS would stop being seen -- and used -- as authoritative.)
Finally, do keep in mind that, although there have been times where the 
numbers have been much different, currently there are 16 documents with 
outstanding DISCUSSes (and I think the total number has been pretty 
stable for a while), and 7 of those are on tomorrow's telechat and 
therefore should hopefully be cleared within a few days of when the 
document could most quickly have been approved anyway. So I'm not sure 
(and we should look at the statistics) how much of a problem this is for 
most documents we are producing.
Now, as to Keith's comments:

> I strongly disagree with what the NON-DISCUSS criteria say. DISCUSS 
> isn't just for blocking documents.   And document quality is as 
> important (in the sense that poor document quality can lead to as many 
> interoperability or other problems) as technical correctness.
> Why are people trying to sabotage IESG?
I'm sorry Keith, but your last line is rubbish. To claim that what 
people in this thread are talking about amounts to an attempt to 
sabotage the IESG is the height of hubris. In my opinion, the IESG has 2 
jobs as far as document review goes: (1) Check for serious technical 
problems that the WG might not have considered and make sure they get 
considered; and (2) Make sure that our processes have been followed to 
assure that the WG products are truly the product of (IETF-wide) 
consensus and fit within the policies of the IETF. I am *positive* that 
I have failed to limit my DISCUSSes on documents to one of those two 
reasons; I expect I will err and do so in the future. I should be 
corrected. We reject kings, and should.
As for the rest: The IESG should be looking for technical correctness 
problems and identify those that do not appear to have been properly 
considered by the WG, but trying to police document quality beyond that, 
including all of those listed in the NON-DISCUSS criteria, really are 
out of bounds for the IESG to be concerning themselves with. Sure, there 
are issues of clarity that can result in interoperability problems, but 
every one of those I have seen is because the words written can be read 
in a technically incorrect way. My take is you are solidly in the rough 
on the question of the DISCUSS/NON-DISCUSS criteria.
 Our documents are never going to be perfect and attempts to make them 
so actually lessen the quality of our output over the long term.
pr

--
Pete Resnick<http://www.qualcomm.com/~presnick/>
Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. - +1 (858)651-4478