Re: [tao-discuss] Review Request for Possible Revision of the Tao of the IETF

[Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail]>]

Hi,

At https://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~brian/Diff-oldSplit.md-Tao.md.htm is a sort-of diff between the markdown version of the current (old) Tao and the proposed new one.

To make this possible, I ran the old markdown file through a little Python script that splits and rewraps the file so that rfcdiff can use it. The 
script (a) attempts to find lines in the new Tao that also exist in the old Tao and ensure that they start a new line, and (b) otherwise simply wraps the old Tao at column 72.

I also had to manually split a few lines that my script coughed on, and a 
few lines in Tao.md that were not actually wrapped at 72.

I hope this helps a bit. Rich is right, though, that one has to review the whole text, not just diffs.

I volunteer to do a review, but it will take some days...

Regards
    Brian Carpenter

On 09-Apr-22 08:19, Warren Kumari wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Thu, Apr 07, 2022 at 4:50 PM, Brian E Carpenter <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>> wrote:
> 
>     Well, I sent that message without proof-reading, so where I wrote:
> 
>         I urge the IETF, busy as you are, to take this review issue seriously.
> 
>     I meant:
> 
>     I urge the IESG, busy as you are, to take this review issue seriously.
> 
>     But I wasn't wrong. I think RFC6722 was very wrong not to require IETF review of updates to the Tao, especially for a massive update like this one. It's quite unreasonable to put that extra load on the IESG alone. 
RFC6722 being informational, it isn't a rule, so I urge the IESG to put this out for community review. That can only make it better.
> 
> 
> I'll note that, even if RFC6722 were a "Standards Track With A Cherry On The Top" document, what it says is:
> "The Tao has traditionally been an IETF consensus document, which means 
that the IESG has had the final say about what the Tao contained before it was sent to the RFC Editor.  Thus, the IESG should have final 
say regarding what the Tao says when it is a web page."
> 
> I read that as "it used to be a consensus document, and the IESG had final say. As a web-page the IESG still has final say", with an implication 
that the same sort of review would continue to be done.  There is nothing that says that the IESG should do the review on our own, nor that we cannot or should not ask the community, just that the final say/approval is the responsibility of the IESG.
> 
> When it used to be published as an IETF consensus document, the normal process would have been for the IESG to ask the community to review it (by doing a last-call). I don't think that we can use the current tooling to do a last-call of a web-page/site/something other than a draft, but it does seem like we should be able to do something close enough by sending mail — something like:
> 
> ---
> The IESG has received a request from the editor of the Tao to consider the new version: <here>
> 
> For background, RFC6722 - Publishing the "Tao of the IETF" as a Web Page (https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc6722.html <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc6722.html>) describes the process by when the Tao of the IETF is 
edited and published as a webpage.
> 
> The IESG plans to make a decision in the next few weeks, and solicits final
> comments on this action. Please send substantive comments to the
> [e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]> mailing lists by 2022-04-15. Exceptionally, comments may
> be sent to [e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]> instead. In either case, please retain the beginning
> of the Subject line to allow automated sorting.
> 
> ----
> 
> Actually, I personally think that the Tao itself should be still published as an RFC, which can then be prettied up into "glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each" and posted on the website, but that's just my personal view - I don't really know the history behind RFC6722, and so I don't know why we moved away from that model.
> 
> W
> 
> 
> 
> 
>     Regards
>     Brian
>     On 08-Apr-22 08:36, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
> 
> 
>         On 08-Apr-22 07:52, Salz, Rich wrote:
> 
>                 I would ask though that going forward, we find a way for the IESG to review just the changes to the Tao again - that is how we usually evaluate "bis" documents. ADs don't have much time, and reviewing a diff is much faster than reviewing an entire document.
> 
>             FWIW, I recommend that going forward, the IESG doesn't review this document, as it doesn't officially review the rest of the website 
either.
> 
>         And there's the bug. Not only the lack of IESG review, but also 
the lack of community review, of our face presented to the world.
> 
>             Maybe it should be an EMODIR document.
> 
>         EMO does a great job. But that doesn't exempt their output from 
community review.
> 
>         I urge the IETF, busy as you are, to take this review issue seriously.
> 
>         Brian
> 
>             Ah well, I'll have a 6722-bis to bring to DISPATCH for IETF 
114.
> 
> 
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