2020-09-21-rsoc-minutes
slides-interim-2022-rfcedprog-10-sessa-2020-09-21-rsoc-minutes-00

RFC SERIES OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE (RSOC)
September 21, 2020 RSOC Meeting

Reported by: Cindy Morgan, IETF Secretariat

ATTENDEES
---------------------------------
 Sarah Banks (RSOC Chair) 
 Jay Daley (IETF LLC Board Liaison, non-voting)
 Cullen Jennings (IAB Lead)
 John Levine, (Temporary RFC Series Project Manager, non-voting)
 Cindy Morgan (Scribe, non-voting)
 Adam Roach
 Peter Saint-Andre

GUEST
---------------------------------
 Sandy Ginoza (RFC Production Center)

REGRETS
---------------------------------
  Tony Hansen 
  Mark Nottingham 

RSOC DECISIONS: 2020
---------------------------------
  - 2020-05-27: RSOC agrees that the RFC Series should plan to be able 
    to regenerate the output formats of RFCs. Related action item: John 
    Levine to draft a plan that defines when it is appropriate to 
    regenerate the output formats of RFCs.

  - 2019 Decisions: <https://www.iab.org/wp-content/IAB-uploads/2020/01/rsoc-decisions-2019.txt>

ACTION ITEM REVIEW
---------------------------------

  Done:

  - 2020-06-22: RSOC to review the plan that defines when it is 
    appropriate to regenerate the output formats of RFCs and what 
    version control mechanisms should be used, and provide feedback on 
    the RSOC list.

  - 2020-07-20: Jay Daley to take the proposed version control 
    mechanism for RFC outputs that are regenerated to legal counsel and 
    ask if it will be sufficient for responding to subpoenas.

  - 2020-07-20: Sarah Banks, Jay Daley, Sandy Ginoza, and John Levine 
    to act as a design team and propose a new SLA for the RSOC to 
    review. 

  OBE:

  - 2020-07-20: John Levine to write up a proposal for a version 
    control mechanism for RFC output formats have been regenerated. 
    * See new action item below.

  In Progress:

  - 2020-06-22: John Levine to document the factors that appear to 
    contribute to the very low adoption by authors of v3 XML as a 
    submission format.
    * Deadline: July RSOC meeting, 2020-07-20.

  New:

  - 2020-09-21: Jay Daley to draft a survey to ask authors who have 
    submitted RFCs in the past year what submission format they used, 
    and (if applicable) why they did not use the v3 XML submission 
    format.
    * Deadline: October RSOC meeting

  - 2020-09-21: John Levine to resolve the open issues on the "RFC v3 
    Issues" document.
    (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Q-DfUxnVV2hZzI7ecWREFgt4tCz-DX_mikqN9RX4Yco/)
    * Deadline: 2020-09-28

  - 2020-09-21: John Levine to draft a message to the community asking 
    for input on how to handle version control for RFC output formats 
    that have been regenerated and send it to the RSOC for review.
    * Deadline: 2020-10-02.

  - 2020-09-21: Jay Daley, John Levine, Henrik Levkowetz, Peter Saint-
    Andre, and Robert Sparks to work with Sandy Ginoza to propose a 
    minimum profile of v3 XML tags to be added by the RPC.
    * Deadline: 2020-10-21

  - 2020-09-21:  Sarah Banks to update the IAB on the current plan to 
    reinstate the SLA.
    * Deadline: 2020-10-02


MINUTES
---------------------------------

1. Administrivia

  The minutes of the 2020-07-20 RSOC meeting were approved.


2. v3 Issues and Tools

  The action item to document the factors that appear to contribute to 
  the very low adoption by authors of v3 XML as a submission format 
  remains open. Jay Daley suggested surveying authors who have submitted 
  an RFC for publication over the past year. RSOC agreed that was a good 
  idea.

  * Action item: Jay Daley to draft a survey to ask authors who have 
    submitted RFCs in the past year what submission format they used, 
    and (if applicable) why they did not use the v3 XML submission 
    format.
    Deadline: October RSOC meeting

  Jay Daley reported that he consulted with legal counsel about version 
  control mechanisms, and they said that there is no risk for RSOC and 
  therefore RSOC is not restricted in what they choose to do with 
  regards to PDF naming or versioning.

  RSOC discussed the plan to define when it is appropriate to regenerate 
  the output formats of RFCs and what version control mechanisms should 
  be used. The plan is described in the "RFC v3 Issues" document.

  * Action item: John Levine to resolve the open issues on the "RFC v3 
    Issues" document 
    Deadline: 2020-09-28

  RSOC discussed whether version control is still needed for regenerated 
  RFCs, given the advice from legal counsel. Sarah Banks said that as a 
  consumer of RFCs, she would want a way to know that the version that 
  she was looking at was the most recent. John Levine replied that the 
  most recent version is always available from the RFC Editor website. 
  Sarah noted that won't work for RFCs that were previously downloaded.

  Jay Daley noted if a version control mechanism is used, it must be 
  clear that the version control relates to when an RFC was generated by 
  the tools, not the text of the RFC itself. He suggested asking the 
  community for input on how to handle this.

  * Action item: John Levine to draft a message to the community asking 
    for input on how to handle version control for RFC output formats 
    that have been regenerated and send it to the RSOC for review.
    Deadline: 2020-10-02.


3. SLA

  John Levine suggested re-establishing the same SLA that was in place 
  before the v3 change, with the understanding that the RPC will need to
  keep additional staff in order to do that. 

  Jay Daley observed that much of the extra work for the RPC comes from 
  having to add both the formatting and semantic markup. He asked 
  whether it would be reasonable to define a minimum profile of v3 XML 
  tags to be added by the RPC in order to reduce the amount of work (and 
  therefore cost) for the RPC. However, he noted that because XML is now 
  the canonical RFC format, if new tags are added later, they will never 
  be shown in the canonical file. With a limited set of required tags, 
  some formatting nuances might be lost.

  Cullen Jennings said that the optional tags could still be included if 
  the authors used them in the XML they submit to the RPC.

  * Action item: Jay Daley, John Levine, Henrik Levkowetz, Peter Saint-
    Andre, and Robert Sparks to work with Sandy Ginoza to propose a 
    minimum profile of v3 XML tags to be added by the RPC.
    Deadline: 2020-10-21

  Sarah Banks will draft an email to the IAB to update them on the 
  current plan for reinstating the SLA:

    - Define a minimum profile of v3 XML tags to be added by the RPC.
    - Figure out how much work is added by adding those v3 XML tags.
    - Reinstate the previous SLA, but keep the staffing headcount high 
      enough to meet the demand caused by the extra v3 work.

  * Action item: Sarah Banks to update the IAB on the current plan to 
    reinstate the SLA.
    Deadline: 2020-10-02


4. Upcoming RSOC Meetings

  Sarah Banks asked RSOC if they wanted to continue to meet on the third 
  Monday of the month at the same time. The people who were on the call 
  agreed, but noted that they should not make a decision without 
  consulting the RSOC members who were unable to attend this meeting. 
  Sarah Banks will send an email to RSOC to follow up on this.


5. Other Business

  There was no other business.