Re: [Pesci-discuss] Draft BOF agenda

[Sam Hartman <[e-mail]>]

Hi.  I asked Brian to send this here so I could respond on the open
list rather than continuing a private discussion with the team.

After talking to Brian I've realized there are two things going on
with pesci.  First, we're defining a set of principles for how we
handle process change and proposing next steps to accomplish process
change.  Second, at the same time, we're trying to create principles
to seed and direct the process change effort (section 4.2.3 through 4.2.7).  The
hope is that we can focus and limit discussions by having a common
vision of where we are going.  Brian points to section 2.2 of BCP 101
as an example of how this worked for us in the past.  We had a long
discussion on the IETF list on those principles, but once we agreed,
it made the rest of the document easier.


Realizing that we had both of these efforts underway was helpful for
me at least.  I kept trying to figure out why the second
part--deciding on general principles to seed process change--mattered.
It seems like we have a lot of process change proposals around and I
couldn't figure out where these principles would come into play.  It
seemed like either a proposal would work its way through the process
change process and lead to consensus or to failure.  At some level
that's true.  However I can see that the principles will, should they
achieve strong community consensus, be a valuable tool for the
community in focusing its discussion and forming consensus around
specific proposals.


I am still concerned that having a focused BOF that attemptes to get
agreement on both principles for how to conduct process change plus
the next steps for process change and on principles to seedand direct
that process change effort.  I also wonder whether a BOF is the right
forum to really discuss the guiding principles to seed and direct our
process change.  Here are some of the potential failure conditions I
see.  We might spend too much time discussing one part of what we're
trying to accomplish and fail to get consensus or adequately discuss
the other part.  We might find that the BOF is not a good enough
community cross-section for the general principles discussion and that
we end up thinking we've reached agreement only to find in the plenary
we've wasted our time and created bad will.

My inclination is to focus the BOF discussion on principles for
process change and on next steps and to hold the general principles
discussion on the list, in the plenary and probably later on the ietf
list.  However I'm open to other proposals for maintaining bof focus
and for addressing my concerns of the previous paragraph.

Regardless, I would recommend separating the principles discussion on
the agenda.  Please consider discussing the process change principles
(4.1, 4.2.1 and 4.2.2) separatly from the more general principles
(4.2.3 through 4.2.7).  You may consider 4.1.1 to be part of the more
general principles.

Finally, this message has been composed without input from Bert.  I
know that we were in fairly close alignment last week, but my thinking
has changed significantly based on reading the draft and on
discussions via jabber with Brian.  I don't know if Bert will agree
with this proposal.  I was not able to get ahold of him before sending
this message.

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