Standards

[Dave Crocker]

Folks,

Wednesday, February 19, 2003, 6:30:09 AM, you wrote:
MW> What we need is a way to:

1)  A PS is supposed to have no "known" errors.  However there is nothing
that says that a PS is required to try to solve any particular scope of
requirement.

That is, a PS is allowed to tackle a very narrow problem, if the PS will
in fact do something useful.  Narrow scope makes it easier to do things
in a more timely fashion and with a better understanding of what is
being done.

Instead, we currently see WGs try to carve off and solve problems with
very large scope.


2) The requirement for implementation experience before going to PS is
applied selectively.  The historical criteria for requiring it -- rather
than at Draft -- is when the specification affects existing Internet
infrastructure or the "physics" of the specified mechanism are poorly
understood.

As Klensin and other have noted, the distinction between DS and FS has
disappreared, and we rarely even go to DS.  However the milestone that
DS is supposed to representation, namely experience using the spec,
really is important.

a) We should make much more liberal use of Experimental.  It gets the
specification out the door, but carries a label that is extremely
unambiguous.

b) We should compress DS and FS into one.

c) I believe we should NOT change the formal requirements for PS; they
really strike quite a good balance.

d) However we should stop trying to stuff everything, INCLUDING the
kitchen sink, in a PS effort, especially for an entirely new service;
and we should stop nit-picking PS details.

d/
--
 Dave Crocker <mailto:dcrocker at brandenburg.com>
 Brandenburg InternetWorking <http://www.brandenburg.com>
 t +1.408.246.8253; f +1.866-358-5301