[dhcwg] Adoption process for 3315bis. DHCwg participants please review.

[Ted Lemon <[e-mail]>]

On Mar 4, 2015, at 8:17 AM, Bernie Volz (volz) <[e-mail]> wrote:
> Reminder that this adoption call concludes March 9th.
> 
> I haven’t seen anyone comment on whether the DHC WG should adopt this document. We need SOME indication that people are in favor of having the WG adopt this document.
>  
> I am in favor of having the WG adopt this work – but as I am a co-author on the document, that is not a surprise.

I'm going to expound at length on this on the mailing list because I think that every working group participant should be aware of this, and it concerns me that I see calls for adoption phrased this way on a regular basis.

The working group chairs do not need the permission of the working group to adopt the document.   The point of a call for adoption is to see if anyone objects.   Dead silence means the document is adopted, because nobody objected.   We do not want to see content-free expressions of support, because the IETF doesn't vote, and expressions of support are votes.

The working group is chartered to do this work.   The work already has consensus, unless someone objects.   This will be true of the last call as well.   The one difference with the last call is that it would be worrisome of the document didn't have significant qualified review, because it's an important document for the working group which we hope to move to Internet Standard.   But for adoption, the fact that we have a design team with ~five active working group participants working on the document, and that it's in the charter, is all that really needs to be said unless someone objects.   We've seen how objections are handled with the discussion of the sedhcpv6 draft: we've had a pretty much textbook drill-down discussion on that in recent weeks based on an objection that was raised.

If this all sounds very informal and vague, you might want to read RFC 2418.   It doesn't even mention working group adoption, and allows for documents to pass working group last call for a variety of reasons.   It would also be worth reading RFC 7282, which talks at length about the IETF consensus process.

Anyway, sorry for making you the recipient of a public lecture, Bernie, but it seemed like a good opportunity to revisit how working groups operate with respect to drafts.

Bernie also raised the good question of how to do the last call consensus call given that the working group chairs, ad and secretary are all editors on the document.   The answer is, just do the consensus call.   Explain how you arrived at your conclusion.   Make it clear to the working group and to the new AD, Terry, the potential for conflict of interest, and the correct avenue for protest if someone thinks the call was done wrong because of that conflict of interest.

It is entirely appropriate, and indeed is the duty of a working group participant who is not comfortable with the outcome of the consensus call to raise it with Terry, and I am explicitly urging you to do this.   I've known Bernie and Tomek for a long time and have complete confidence in their ability to avoid being biased in making the consensus call, but working group participants should all feel comfortable with the consensus process.   I expect Terry to look closely at the consensus process for this document even if nobody explicitly asks him to.   Well, I guess I'm explicitly asking him to.   :)