Keeping working groups open: Was Re: A non response ...

["Karl Auerbach, Empirical Tools and Technologies, 408/427-5280" <[e-mail]>]

 > > Given the mass of new material, I found it odd that on the same day
 > > that the RFCs were announced, that the working groups were deemed to
 > > have completed their charters and summarily dissolved, leaving no
 > > effective focus for continued SNMPv2 discussions.
 > 
 > karl - i don't understand your comment.  working groups exist until they fulfill
 > their charter; mailing lists continue.  the snmpV2 wg completed it's charter,
 > as did the snmp sec wg.  when snmpV2 comes up for standards track review,
 > a new charter re-activating the wg will be prepared.  the snmp sec wg will be
 > folded into the snmpV2 wg.

As a lawyer who understands how procedure can be used to pre-decide
issues, I can understand the adhere-to-procedure-at-all-costs
approach under which the WG's were considered "done" and disbanded.
The ability to prorogue is a very strong tool.

However, with the SNMPv2 documents becoming RFC's, and representing
as they do, perhaps the single most complicated protocol in the
internet community(*), it would be appropriate to keep open an
oganized means of discussion with a designated issue
collector/moderator.

[(*) The only competitors for "most complicated protocol" might be
OSPF or X.]

 > for now, the snmpV2 mailing list exists as a forum for discussing experiences, as well as a forum for pointless messages of little or no redeeming value.

"Pointless" "Little or no redeeming value".  Could we please avoid
this kind of language?  It doesn't bother me when flung in my
direction, but it could discourage others who actually have some
competent, but perhaps not completely perfectly formed, comments from
speaking. 

As a general matter, I believe that the standards process should be
modified so that working goups continue to exist as standards
progress and that the chairman be given veto power over any decision
to advance the standard to the next level.

And I do not believe that a working group should be disbanded until
the members agree that they have met their goals.

			--karl--