Subject: Re: Concern about a survey response

From: Lakshminath Dondeti <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 05 Feb 2008 14:01:56 -0800

I could be on both sides of that kind of a statement and so I will take 
a crack at it.

I am sure I have said that "Progress is very slow and the individual 
influence is minimal" and claimed that is the case even when that 
individual is right.  Aah, therein lies the problem.  If I am the person 
claiming to be right, it would seem most logical to me and I'd get 
frustrated and throw a fit :).  For others it is not always so clear. 
So for instance, in one case, someone has told me that yeah well, I know 
what you are saying about requirement X (from other organization Y), but 
I would like to hear from more people (from organization Y).  It may not 
always be possible to get people from other organizations lined up to 
come to meetings or participate in our discussions; they also tend to 
talk about specifics and we tend to design protocols and mechanisms for 
generic cases.  I use the LS mechanism, but our/the IETF processing of 
LSs is rather erratic.  Now I tend to get work done at some rate, but I 
can imagine new people having real troubles if they were in my shoes.

On the other hand, I am sure in MSEC, I tell people to go and get people 
from WG Z engaged and have them come and tell us that there is a 
requirement.  I think I did this in case of proposed OSPF and RSVP uses 
of group keying.  There were individuals who depending on the case have 
been trying to get stuff adopted, but for whatever reason progress can 
only be made, it appears, at f2f meetings.  Given how busy those 
meetings are, it appears that progress is very, well, slow does not 
begin to describe it (that is if I put myself in those people's shoes). 
  If I were them, I would organize telecons between meetings, start 
email discussions and get people agree or disagree.  I have said as 
much, and some people have followed up on that advice, but others have 
not.  Perhaps they are not in a hurry (but then they wouldn't be the 
source of the "slow" comment).  Although, if there is an MSEC meeting, 
they'll ask to present the same issue and ask about next steps.

regards,
Lakshminath

On 2/5/2008 6:24 AM, Russ Housley wrote:
> As you know, the IAOC does a survey after each IETF meeting.  We got the 
> following comment in the last survey, which might be a concern for WG 
> Chairs.  It said:
> 
>     "Progress is very slow and the individual influence is minimal."
> 
> Of course, this is anonymous, so we do not know which Area or WG the 
> survey response is targeting.
> 
> Clearly, every WG Chair needs to balance many things that could have 
> lead to a comment like this.  We do not want a newbie to cause a WG to 
> revisit previously closed topics -- that would make the process even 
> slower.
> 
> The inability of an individual to influence the IETF documents could be 
> a big concern, or it could be completely appropriate.  If someone is 
> coming to the meeting with implementation experience and it being 
> ignored, then I'm quite concerned.  If someone is bitter because they 
> are unable to convince others to agree with them (that is they are in 
> the rough), then I'm completely unconcerned.
> 
> I'd like each WG Chair to think about this comment in the context of 
> their WG.
> 
> Russ
> 
>