Re: WG Charter Milestones

[Paul Hoffman <[e-mail]>]

On Jul 1, 2011, at 2:10 PM, Jeffrey Hutzelman wrote:

> The change we're discussing is to get the human secretariat staff out of
> the loop, on the grounds that they already have too much to do and that
> latency on these sorts of operations will be lower if they don't have to
> wait to reach the top of someone's work queue.

That is not, in fact, the grounds on which we are making the change. I apologize if the introduction to draft-ietf-genarea-milestones-tool didn't make that clearer. What it currently says is:

   Today, the tasks associated with creating and updating WG milestones
   are performed manually.  Normally, WG chairs send email to their Area
   Director (AD) requesting that milestones be created or updated, or
   saying that one or more milestone has been met.  These messages
   sometimes come as part of charter creation or updating, but are often
   separate (such as if a current milestone is met but there is no
   reason to update the charter itself).  WG chairs sometimes send mail
   directly to the IETF Secretariat to make a change to the database of
   milestones, such as to change the dates for milestones or to say that
   they are completed.

   In early 2011, the IETF approved a set of requirements for a tool
   that helps ADs with the WG chartering and rechartering process
   [CHARTER-TOOL].  During the IESG discussion of that document, it
   became clear that everyone wanted more automation to the milestones
   process.  This document, and the discussion it will hopefully
   engender, is intended to bring that discussion to a general consensus
   among WG chairs and ADs for the requirements for the eventual tool.

   The IAOC would like to create a better tool for the tasks of WG
   milestone creation and updating, and this document lists the
   requirements for such a tool.

That is, this is not about "too much to do" or "latency"; it is simply about more automation. With the model as it is currently described, an AD gets to decide how much to maximize the automation. He or (historically) she can set it to 10 for a WG by allowing the chairs to do all the steps without AD approval, or set it to 8 by requiring AD approval. (Having this all be done in the web pushes it well past the "hopefully the email gets read" automation of today.)

> There are (at least) two ways to go about this.
> One allows the AD to make the change directly.
> The other allows the AD or the chair to make the change directly.

There is the third way, which is described in the draft that this thread is about.

> In either case, we are talking about altering the implementation, so
> that milestone changes are effected by a different person.  We are not
> talking about changing the policy, which is that milestone changes are
> not effected until approved by an area director.

In fact, the draft is mostly silent on this. The draft says "Any AD can add or update any milestone for any WG", and the unstated intention is that if a WG chair makes a change that an AD disagrees with, the AD can reverse the change. That is quite different than "not effected until approved by an area director".

--Paul Hoffman