Subject: [RTG-DIR] Plan for reorganizing the Routing Area

From: Alia Atlas <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 30 May 2014 15:53:17 -0400

To all the Routing WG Chairs & Routing Directorate Members:

Enclosed is an email that we intend to send to [email-masked]
on
Monday June 9.

As you may recall, Adrian and I asked how to improve getting work done
in the area.  After discussion, we think that includes working group
reorganization.

We depend very heavily upon you to come up with solid proposals for
the reorganized WGs and their suggested WG chairs.

Thanks,
Alia & Adrian

=============================

To all participants in the Routing Area,

Adrian and I are working on improving the quality, speed, and
experience of getting work done in the IETF Routing Area.  There are
three initiatives that we are working: WG Draft QA, Routing Area
specific WG chair training, and reorganizing the working groups in the
area.

First, we intend to use our Routing Directorate more proactively by
introducing a Working Group Draft Quality Assurance (WG Draft QA)
process where the same selected routing directorate member will review
a draft during WG draft adoption and during WG last call.  The process
will be documented on the Routing Area wiki.  This should allow
directorate reviews to report technical issues that can actually get
fixed early in the process (equiv of bug reports) as opposed to just
noting the concerns in the drafts (equiv of release notes).

Second, in addition to the IETF-wide WG chair training, we intend to
have a series of training sessions for WG Chairs in the Routing Area
addressing topics such as judging consensus, project management,
motivating volunteers, using the datatracker (via a sandbox version
that can be safely played with), and sharing experiences between WG
chairs.

Third, we intend to reorganize the working groups in the Routing area.
We feel that it is important to focus on areas where there is active
interest in standardization and to be open and able to accept new work
into the area.  As you know, we have had several new working groups
(nvo3, i2rs, sfc, spring) created in the last few years and we need to
be open and able to handle more new work as it comes in.  We would
also like to improve the signal-to-noise ratio experienced by
participants in the different working groups and improve the quantity
and quality of discussion and reviews.  It is likely that not all WGs
in the Routing Area will be directly affected.

Here is the time-line for reorganizing the WGs.

   NOW: public discussion on [email-masked] about how to
   reorganize the working groups to best meet our motivations.
   Additional focused discussions are expected on the
   [email-masked] and [email-masked] mailing lists.

   In Toronto: There will be meetings with the WG chairs and the
   Routing Directorate to get the ideas described and agreed upon.

   At the Routing Area Meeting in Toronto: Discuss the set of
   reorganized WGs and general charter content in the Routing Area
   meeting.

   September 2014: Based upon the feedback, suggestions, and
   discussion, Adrian and I finalize the reorganized WG charters.  We
   start the internal IESG and public reviews.

   October 2014: Formal rechartering process completes.

   In Honolulu: The new set of WGs meet.

   After Honolulu: Adrian and I deal with any issues and charter
   updates based upon a few months of experience.

Here are the motivations that Adrian and I would like to be considered
when coming up with ideas for how the WGs should be reorganized.

   1) Towards functional organization instead of just protocol

   2) Split giant working groups so relevant work done together with
   improved signal-to-noise ratio for participants

   3) Create synergies for scattered functionality (example ideas:
   OAM, FRR, traffic-engineering)

   4) DISPATCH working group for clear new idea discussion; rtgwg
   serves some of this purpose but doesn't have a clear process and
   isn't drawing in the new ideas.

   5) Focus Routing Area time on design centers rather than on far
   corner cases.

   6) Each working group should have clear, well defined, and achievable
goals.

Noting that the Routing Area has inherited some of its WG structure
from the sub-IP area, it is not a goal to force IP routing and MPLS
routing to remain separated.

For those of you that have read this far, thank you.  Getting this 80%
right is going to take some serious discussion and thought.  We all
work in the Routing Area together with different perspectives.  Please
think carefully and help us have a highly focused discussion.

Thanks,

---

From: Alexander Vainshtein <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 31 May 2014 09:24:08 +0000

Alia, Adrian,

A few naïve questions if you do not mind:

  1.  How do I subscribe to the  [email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]> list?
  2.  Your email mentions splitting some "giant" WGs. Could you provide a couple of specific examples of the WGs you consider giant? IMO this would be most helpful for effective discussion, since I suspect that a giant WG could be very different for different people.
  3.  For the sake of curiosity, do you consider also conclusion of some WGs as part of the re-organization? The email does not mention that.
  4.  Do you expect the RTG-DIR reviews you mention as part of the WG Draft QA process to be in addition to or instead of the RTG-DIR reviews as they are done today (i.e., during the IESG Last Call)?  IMHO and FWIW it should be an addition, with different RTG-DIR members doing these reviews, because adding a fresh pair of eyes looking at the draft is quite valuable; but I do not know whether this is feasible .
  5.  Creating synergies for scattered functionalities is very important; however, I believe that this cannot be provided by just reorganization of the WGs. Just thinking aloud - maybe we need a process that would identify cross-WG items early and effectively handle them in a cross-WG manner all the way?

My 2c,

Sasha

________________________________
From: rtg-dir <[email-masked]> on behalf of Alia Atlas <[email-masked]>
Sent: Friday, May 30, 2014 10:53 PM
To: [email-masked]; Adrian Farrel
Subject: [RTG-DIR] Plan for reorganizing the Routing Area

Enclosed is an email that we intend to send to [email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]> on
Monday June 9.

Thanks,
Alia & Adrian

   NOW: public discussion on [email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]> about how to
   reorganize the working groups to best meet our motivations.
   Additional focused discussions are expected on the
   [email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]> and [email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]> mailing lists.

   6) Each working group should have clear, well defined, and achievable goals.

Thanks,

---

From: "Adrian Farrel" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 31 May 2014 14:22:24 +0100

Hello Sasha,

> A few naïve questions if you do not mind:

I don't think a question can be naive.

> 1. How do I subscribe to the  [email-masked] list?

https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/routing-discussion

> 2. Your email mentions splitting some "giant" WGs. Could you provide
> a couple of specific examples of the WGs you consider giant? IMO this
> would be most helpful for effective discussion, since I suspect that a
> giant WG could be very different for different people.

Weeeeeeell, yes I could, and I do have some things in mind. But I would prefer
for this to be a more open discussion and get ideas and opinions from the area
rather than stamp my views on you all.

> 3. For the sake of curiosity, do you consider also conclusion of some
> WGs as part of the re-organization? The email does not mention that.

Yes, it probably should mention this as a possibility, and everything is on the
table. But, again, I'd like to hear opinions. Maybe work should be grouped
together resulting in one new WG in place of two old ones. Maybe something is
coming to its natural end or has run out of steam. Discuss...

> 4. Do you expect the RTG-DIR reviews you mention as part of the
> WG Draft QA process to be in addition to or instead of the RTG-DIR
> reviews as they are done today (i.e., during the IESG Last Call)?  IMHO
> and FWIW it should be an addition, with different RTG-DIR members
> doing these reviews, because adding a fresh pair of eyes looking at
> the draft is quite valuable; but I do not know whether this is feasible .

Good question.  What do others think? Should we continue to review during IETF
last call as well as at WG adoption and WG last call? Should it be the same
reviewer all the way through, or a different reviewer at different times?

> 5. Creating synergies for scattered functionalities is very important;
> however, I believe that this cannot be provided by just reorganization
> of the WGs. Just thinking aloud - maybe we need a process that would
> identify cross-WG items early and effectively handle them in a cross-
> WG manner all the way?  

Yes, I'd like to explore that idea and see what processes we would need and how
this might work.

> My 2c,

And welcomed.

Adrian

---

From: "Andrew G. Malis" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 31 May 2014 13:44:48 -0400

Adrian,

Good question.  What do others think? Should we continue to review during
> IETF

My own two cents on your first particular question is that resources (in
this case, people's time) are not infinite, and thus should be focused
where they'll be most effective. To me, that means earlier in the process
is better than later, and if a draft has already been reviewed by the
directorate during (at least) WG adoption and WG LC, than yet another
review during IETF LC would be superfluous.

On your second question, I think different reviewers is better, it gets you
a fresh pair of eyes on the draft and helps vary the work for the
reviewers, which makes it more interesting for them.

Cheers,
Andy

---

From: Loa Andersson <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 01 Jun 2014 05:12:16 +0200

Andy and Adrian,

On 2014-05-31 19:44, Andrew G. Malis wrote:
> where they'll be most effective. To me, that means earlier in the
> process is better than later, and if a draft has already been reviewed
> by the directorate during (at least) WG adoption and WG LC, than yet
> another review during IETF LC would be superfluous.
>
> On your second question, I think different reviewers is better, it gets
> you a fresh pair of eyes on the draft and helps vary the work for the

I'm not sure about this.

I think that

(1) early is better, but that does not mean that late review is not
good or necessary.

Example: We had recently a case where we discovered  fundamental mistake
during the IANA review -  had reviewed the document myself at least 4
times and had not seen it before. Exception - yes but good have it
mended before we had to do it through the Errata process.

(2) I think that a reviewer that have followed the document from the
call for wg adoption (in our case MPLS-RT review, all the way through
to the IESG evaluation has much to contribute; on the other hand fresh
eyes are certainly good.

I think the conclusion is - do as much review as you can.

As Andy I concerned about the expectations we place on rtg-dir members!

/Loa

PS

I do not say that we shouldn't do this, but I'm not immediately 
enthusiastic. Would be good to have a more exact problem description.

-- 

Loa Andersson                        email: [email-masked]
Senior MPLS Expert                          [email-masked]
Huawei Technologies (consultant)     phone: +46 739 81 21 64