Re: [Icar] Progress?

[Dave Crocker <[e-mail]>]

Mark,


MA> I.e., if we don't invoke the review function as an explicit step in the
MA> process will anyone do it?

We already have some working groups doing it. How do we get more? I
think that this is a matter of culture and educating folks about
benefits and, to some extent, expectations. Let's assume that
participants want good things. This is a reasonable assumption almost
all the time. This means that a benefits-oriented approach should
work, without the need of coercion.

Simple examples of how to 'sell' the idea of early, (external)
(cross-area) reviews:  Working Group chair training touts
it. ADs suggest it -- repeatedly.  Experienced participations suggest
it -- repeatedly.

I think there is also benefit in having a centralized index for
accessing reviews, so that the community can see what it happening in
that front.  It also serves to mark the possible snowball effect that
you cite.


MA>   But, in the absence of experience
MA> that concretely shows that some sort of early review function is, in
MA> fact, useful and worthwhile what is the incentive for a WG to invoke the
MA> review function?

If reviewing proposals were an odd or new idea then we might have to
worry about selling the basic concept.  But this is all pretty
standard stuff in the academic and engineering community.  Getting
fresh sets of expert eyes to look things over is not a controversial
concept and the benefits are well-established.


MA> The other thing I wonder about is new-ish folk in the IETF.  People
MA> bring ideas in that are not really baked, but they don't realize it (new
MA> UDP-based app with no congestion control, no thoughts given to security,
MA> etc.).  What is the incentive for these people to turn around and ask a
MA> bunch of people they don't know to pick apart their work when they are
MA> Obviously Correct?

The question is what is the incentive for a *group* to call for
reviews.  Individuals do not matter much, but the group does.  So the
review process serves to raise important questions about a spec -- or
provide confirmation of its constructs -- before there has been
long-term investment in the effort.  That's pretty strong incentive.


MA> SIRS didn't get much activity in the grand scheme of things.

I've commented on the tendency to dismiss the SIRS experience before.
Quick summary:

SIRS was started during summer and by mid-Fall there were rumors it
had failed. The negative effect this is likely to have had on
continued use of SIRS should not be underestimated.

Particularly given typical IETF timeframes, that anyone would declare
a strategic IETF experiment to have failed after such a short time
suggests deeper problems with either patience levels or agendas.

SIRS did virtually no "marketing" either proactively such as prodding
working groups to use its services, or passively, such as collecting
review data (statistics and source copies of reviews) in a single
place.

On the other hand, it got good signup by folks offering to do reviews
and it did get some review requests.

d/
--
 Dave Crocker <mailto:[e-mail]>
 Brandenburg InternetWorking <http://www.brandenburg.com>
 Sunnyvale, CA  USA <tel:[phone]>, <fax:[phone]>


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