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-
- Process for Organization of Internet Standards (poised)
- -------------------------------------------------------
-
- Charter
-
- Current status: active working group
-
- Chair(s):
- Steve Crocker <crocker@tis.com>
- Mel Pleasant <pleasant@pilot.njin.net>
-
- None Director(s):
- Paul Mockapetris <pvm@isi.edu>
-
- Mailing lists:
- General Discussion:poised@tis.com
- To Subscribe: poised-request@tis.com
- Archive: ietf.cnri.reston.va.us:~/ietf-mail-archive/poised/*
-
- Description of Working Group:
-
-
- In 1992 and 1993, the POISED effort revised the responsibilities of
- the IESG and IAB and instituted a selection process for filling
- positions on these bodies. The ISOC Trustees gave interim approval
- to these arrangements and asked that we revisit, revise and formalize
- the arrangements after two rounds of selection had been completed.
- The POISED Working Group will now review the current rules, propose
- charters and rules for the IESG, IETF, IAB, IRSG, and IRTF, and submit
- them to the ISOC Trustees after approval by the IETF.
-
- There appears to be general consensus that the current assignments of
- responsibility and the selection process are working moderately well,
- so it is not anticipated that there will be large changes.
- Nonetheless, some issues have been raised and need review. Among
- these are:
-
- o There is a complex interplay between the IETF area structure and the
- selection process for the IESG. The IESG has the power to create,
- split, merge and remove areas, but the nominations committee has the
- responsibility to fill positions. The IESG needs some flexibility
- to balance work loads, use its people effectively, and meet the
- changing needs of the IETF. The current rules are not completely
- clear as to how to handle all of the likely situations; these need to
- be spelled out and agreed to.
-
- o The nominations committee has non-voting liaisons from the IESG and
- IAB. Both nominations committees also had current IAB or IESG
- members, who volunteered and were selected at random, as voting
- members. It has been suggested that current IESG and IAB members
- carry too much weight in the deliberations and should be barred from
- serving on the nominations committee.
-
- o The selection and role of the nominations committee chair is somewhat
- unclear. In particular, what power does the chair have to deal with
- unresponsive committee members and/or to resolve disputes?
-
- o At what point, if any, does the nominations committee's list of
- candidates become public. This ties in with the apparent double-
- standard of how publically incumbents vs. non-incumbents announce
- their candidacy.
-
- o The way to handle interim appointments is not clear. Two specific
- issues are: who appoints interim members (and is ``ratification''
- required), and how long does interim appointees serve?
-
- o When the nominations committee has completed its work, it informs the
- IAB and the ISOC Trustees. The procedures for doing so need to be
- spelled out. At issue is when the nominations become public, whether
- the community at large is invited to comment, and what to do if there
- is difficulty in filling any of the positions.
-
- o There is currently no specific mechanism for the IAB to use to
- provide architectural guidance to working groups before the RFC
- submission stage. POISED may discuss whether such a mechanism is
- necessary, and if so, what that mechanism looks like.
-
- o The role of the IRTF and research groups has not yet been defined.
-
- o Should there be a regular mechanism for convening a POISED Working
- Group in the future?
-
- o The ISOC Trustees require that the procedures adopted meet with the
- approval of counsel and the insurance carriers in order to protect
- the Society from exposure. The procedures, rules, etc. adopted by
- the community will most likely be satisfactory to counsel, but input
- and review from counsel is essential.
-
- In its deliberations, POISED may produce new documents (e.g., an IETF
- Charter -- if the lack of such a charter delays the POISED effort),
- and it may request changes to existing documents (e.g., ``The IAB
- Charter'' [RFC 1601], ``The Internet Standards Process -- Version 2''
- [RFC 1602], and ``IETF Working Group Guidelines and Procedures''
- [RFC 1603]).
-
- Goals and Milestones:
-
- Done Produce an Internet-Draft describing the current selection process.
-
- Apr 94 Produce an Internet-Draft summarizing "what's broke".
-
- May 94 Send an e-mail message to the POISED and IETF-Announce mailing lists
- giving people a deadline for inputs to the POISED process.
-
- May 94 First drafts of all documents.
-
- Jul 94 Complete set of documents filed in Internet-Drafts directory.
-
- Jul 94 Toronto IETF meeting.
-
- Dec 94 Present final reports, charters, etc. to ISOC Board at its meeting.
-
-
- Internet-Drafts:
-
- Posted Revised I-D Title <Filename>
- ------ ------- ------------------------------------------
- Apr 94 New <draft-ietf-poised-nomcomm-00.txt>
- Procedure to Select and Confirm Individuals Serving on the IAB
- and IESG
-
- Request For Comments:
-
- RFC Stat Published Title
- ------- -- ---------- -----------------------------------------
- RFC1396 I Jan 93 The Process for Organization of Internet Standards
- Working Group (POISED)
-
- RFC1640 I Jun 94 The Process for Organization of Internet Standards
- Working Group (POISED)
-