Subject: [Ieprep] re-charter?

From: "Ken Carlberg" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 17:43:21 -0400

<warning: this is a bit lengthy and kind of resembles a noel-gram :) >

a couple of months ago there was a brief thread on this list that
discussed the possibility of rechartering IEPREP.  currently, the
charter focuses the attention of IEPREP to requirements and
framework documents.  

however, it had been pointed out in that re-chartering thread that 
there are several individual drafts floating in the I-D ether that 
have varying degrees of relevance to the subject of emergency 
communications, and yet don't seem to have a home.  at both the 
washington-ietf and the minneapolis-ietf (and actually earlier 
meetings if one wants to include some of the rsvp extention work) 
there were attempts to discuss these drafts at the TSVWG meetings, 
but there wasn't much reaction.   Joe Touch's comment at each 
meeting (my paraphrasing) that the "silence was deafening" seemed 
to capture the moment.  on the other hand, it also seemed that a 
considerable chunk of the material that Fred Baker discussed 
(ie, the MLPP drafts) was quite outside of the interest of the 
usual suspects that attend TSVWG.  there seemed to be considerably 
more discussion on Fred's and James's material at the San Diego 
IETF meeting than at the DC and Minneapolis combined -- the 
minutes of each meeting may bear this out, but then that is also 
dependent on who takes the minutes.

while I can't speak for Fred or James as to the reason their MLPP
drafts have been forwarded to TSVWG (one assumes because it is the
catch-all for transport area drafts that have no other home), I can
certainly see that the current charter of IEPREP prevented their
inclusion in IEPREP (because it only deals with requirements and
frameworks).

so that takes us to the subject of this long winded email.  

In the old charter thread, James suggested (words to the effect of) 
we should explore rechartering IEPREP so that it can now address the 
subject of solutions.  its my understanding that some folks at the 
Minneapolis IETF discussed this topic in the hallways, but I am in the 
dark as to the ultimate conclusions.  soooooo, I'd like to revisit this
discussion on the list.  specifially, 

   - what are the objections (if any) to expanding the charter?
     (and if the chairs/ADs have objections, now is the time to
	chime in :-)
   - assuming we have rough consensus of exploring the subject of
     re-chartering, what should the new charter say?

Note, and this is a whopper of a caveat!  All of us need to be in
agreement that *proposed solutions* could only be considered in 
IEPREP where no other *applicable* active working group exists.

Note #2...Perhaps a starting point for any discussion of a proposed
new charter is agreeing on what is considered a solution :-)

comments?

-ken

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From: Fred Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 21:07:23 -0700

> inclusion in IEPREP (because it only deals with requirements and 

That is it in a nutshell.

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From: Rex Buddenberg <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 21 Apr 2005 15:14:12 -0700

Ken,

Thanks for a thoughtful note ... and not too long.

When you apply any technology, and certainly internet technology, to the
problem of emergency services, a bunch of things pertain, not just the
technology ... or the protocols.

In my experience, the internet protocols are pretty good for emergency
services.  The critical issues are things like provisioning -- ensuring
enough elimination of single points of failure that the system doesn't
conk out under stress.  Is not a protocol issue at all -- indeed, the
very design of IP waaaay back when v4 was first set down did the
trick.  

To put this in academic terms, there are three principles of high
availability engineering:
	- elimination of single points of failure
	- reliable crossover
	- prompt detection of failures as they occur.

The first is a provisioning problem, not a protocol one.  The second is
a protocol design one, but been done for years.  The third is solved at
the protocol level by SNMP, but is also a provisioning one (ya gotta
implement it, and at appropriate levels of granularity).

So if an emergency services planner (no, not always an oxymoron) is
looking for a one-stop shop, he won't find it in the RFCs and won't find
it in the current IEPREP charter.  Same problem turned around to a
slightly different view: if the only thing we concentrate on is
protocols (my understanding of the current charter), then we miss some
really important parts of the problem and ones that are not very
susceptible to protocol solutions.  

I'd like to see the charter broadened to include best practices -- a
one-stop how-to kit for planners working emergency services comms (which
should include just about every municipality in the land -- yours too,
Ken).  

-- 
b

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From: "Ken Carlberg" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 22 Apr 2005 07:39:18 -0400

> should include just about every municipality in the land -- yours too,

another perspective beyond best common practices would be one of
an architectural document -- something not very common within the
IETF in the past, but now more commonly seen over the past couple of
years.

-ken