Network Working Group E. Davies, Ed.
Internet-Draft Folly Consulting
Expires: August 30, 2006 February 26, 2006
Organizing IETF Process Change
draft-davies-pesci-next-steps-00
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Abstract
This document sets out a strawman proposal for how to organize the
revision and update of any part of the Internet Engineering Task
Force (IETF) processes including those for developing standards and
other specifications. It does not propose specific changes to any of
these processes, which should be the subject of future documents.
However, it does propose an initial target area for process change.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1. About This Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. A Template for Process Change Organization . . . . . . . . . . 3
2.1. Change Process Proposal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3. Immediate Tasks for the Change Process . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
4. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
5. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
6. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
7. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Intellectual Property and Copyright Statements . . . . . . . . . . 8
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1. Introduction
In a previous document [I-D.davies-pesci-initial-considerations] a
design team selected by the IETF Chair suggested some goals and
guidelines that should be followed in setting out to change any of
the processes used in the IETF. In the light of the design team's
experience, this document suggests a possible way of organizing such
process change work and also identifies a target area as the initial
focus for process change to address the problems that were summarized
in [I-D.davies-pesci-initial-considerations].
[I-D.davies-pesci-initial-considerations] also contains a extensive
reading list of background material which documents many of the
processes which might be the subject of change through the process
suggested in this document. One problem that has been identified is
that this material has been built up piecemeal over the lifetime of
the IETF and it is neither entirely self-consistent nor easy to
navigate even for experienced IETF participants. An overview and
guide to the existing and draft material has been developed
[I-D.carpenter-procdoc-roadmap] as an interim measure.
1.1. About This Document
This document was produced by the PESCI design team selected by the
IETF Chair and is submitted to the IETF community for discussion,
modification, and hopefully expeditious approval. PESCI stands for
Process Evolution Committee of the IETF and is in the IETF's naming
tradition as a successor of the earlier POISSON working group. The
membership of the design team is listed in the Acknowledgements and
the original announcement of PESCI is given as an Appendix. PESCI
has no special status in the IETF process; it is simply the group of
people who produced this document under the leadership of the IETF
Chair.
Discussion of this draft is welcomed on the pesci-discuss@ietf.org
list (join via https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/pesci-discuss).
2. A Template for Process Change Organization
The PESCI design team is proposing a process for developing changes
to the IETF processes especially in the area of developing standards
documentation and other specifications. It is intended that this
should be a template for any future change process that appears to be
required, but in the best traditions of the IETF the process should
itself be tested by experiment and modified if it is found wanting.
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This proposed new process
o would be used by all individuals, design teams, and working groups
who wish to propose changes or additions to IETF processes,
o should involve consultation with the IESG, the IAB, the IAOC, the
Working Group chairs, and IETF participants generally, but
o must avoid requiring the IESG to develop the new processes or
micromanage this process of development and approval.
The new proposals, both for the change process and any resulting
changed processes, should be implemented as a matter of urgency and
should be handled expeditiously by the existing approvals and
publishing process.
2.1. Change Process Proposal
We propose that the design team model is the most effective way of
engineering process changes. The design team is a tried-and-tested
IETF methodology especially suitable for creating concrete solutions
applicable to constrained problems. Within the context of the
existing IETF process, the model would be applied by constituting a
set of design teams with appropriate oversight and the charter of
carrying out process change. The design teams would operate within
these charters: the overseers would invite design team members to
participate, but alternative teams could offer solutions if they feel
they have better solutions.
The teams should function with an open discussion list, in the same
way that the PESCI team has done. The output of each team should be
tested against the IETF consensus in the normal fashion; we believe
that if there is clear IETF consensus that the proposal makes sense,
the IESG (and the ISOC Board of Trustees) will respect that consensus
and approve of it.
3. Immediate Tasks for the Change Process
Assuming that the model suggested in Section 2.1 is adopted, the
following process change task appears to be the most urgent one, and
a team should start on this as soon as possible.
The most important single management role in the IETF at the moment
is that of the IESG, including the role of IETF Chair. This should
therefore also receive the most scrutiny. It's unreasonable to ask
people to grade their own performance, or to attempt to perform a
role at full speed while having to review how it could be done
otherwise. Therefore, a review of the roles the IESG has should be
rooted outside the IESG - while asking current and former IESG
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members for information and advice at every opportunity.
This review should include:
o Creating a list of the tasks that currently gate on the IESG
o Identifying any additional related tasks that might be appropriate
to improve efficiency and effectiveness
o Making proposals for discarding or restructuring the existing
tasks in combination with the new tasks
o Making a proposal for grouping those tasks into separate task
groups that can be assigned to different bodies at need.
o Developing a proposal for how the standards development work of
the IETF should be partitioned to provide optimum efficiency while
allowing the IETF to take on all appropriate work.
o Developing a suggestion for an initial set of bodies for handling
those tasks in the new work partitioning scheme, including, if
appropriate, a restructuring of the IESG.
o Describing the process by which the set of bodies gets modified.
o Describing how members of the proposed bodies get selected,
replaced, and (if needed) removed.
o Proposing a structure for the documentation of the IETF process
that would result from their recommendations
4. Security Considerations
This document has no direct impact on the security of the Internet.
However, a smooth and efficient IETF process is necessary to deal
rapidly with emerging security threats. Also, a badly designed
process may be subject to social denial of service attacks that could
damage both the IETF and indirectly the Internet itself. We should
also note that the change process (and the evaluation of potential
change) is itself vulnerable to social DoS.
5. IANA Considerations
This document does not require action by the IANA. However, IANA
activities do form part of the IETF process and process changes may
affect IANA.
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6. Acknowledgements
The members of the PESCI team at the time this document was written
were:
Harald Alvestrand
Scott Brim
Brian Carpenter
Elwyn Davies
Adrian Farrel
Michael Richardson
This document was produced using the xml2rfc tool [RFC2629] and
edited with the xxe editor plug-in.
7. Informative References
[I-D.carpenter-procdoc-roadmap]
Carpenter, B., "The IETF Process: a Roadmap",
draft-carpenter-procdoc-roadmap-03 (work in progress),
December 2005.
[I-D.davies-pesci-initial-considerations]
Davies, E., "Moving Forwards with IETF Process Evolution",
draft-davies-pesci-initial-considerations-01 (work in
progress), January 2006.
[RFC2629] Rose, M., "Writing I-Ds and RFCs using XML", RFC 2629,
June 1999.
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Author's Address
Elwyn Davies (editor)
Folly Consulting
Soham,
UK
Phone: +44 7889 488 335
Fax:
Email: elwynd@dial.pipex.com
URI:
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