--On Saturday, July 16, 2011 20:27 -0700 "Murray S. Kucherawy" <m...@cloudmark.com> wrote:
>> -----Original Message----- >> From: ietf-boun...@ietf.org [mailto:ietf-boun...@ietf.org] On >> Behalf Of John C Klensin Sent: Friday, July 15, 2011 2:02 PM >> To: Brian E Carpenter >> Cc: v6...@ietf.org; IETF Discussion >> Subject: Re: Another look at 6to4 (and other IPv6 transition >> issues) >> >> Position #2: How the IETF classifies things makes very little >> difference in this space because people will follow advice >> that seems sensible and ignore everything else. If so, it >> makes little difference how your document is approved or >> where it is published. For example, it could have come >> through the Independent Stream or been pushed into CCR. No >> problem. And the "Historic" effort is a huge waste of the >> community's time, no matter how it comes out. > > Well, if this is the prevailing opinion, we can certainly > simplify our procedures substantially by eliminating about > half of the document states we maintain now, including > reducing the standards track down to a single state. I certainly would not claim it is the prevailing opinion. I believe it is true and have seen it in action many times but, beyond that, have no idea. Also remember that the Standards Track (including BCP or not), Experimmental, Informational, Historic breakdown is somewhat orthogonal to the maturity levels within Standards Track. That said, I believe, based in part on consensus in at least one WG that focused on the topic, that, as our standards have become more complex, with more features, options, and interactions, the embodiment of the "maturity level" idea as a single set of category-identifiers has outlived its usefulness. The reality is that some features of a particular specification may be well-tested and very mature while others may still be a bit questionable and that some specifications may be more appropriate to some environments and less appropriate to others. >From that point of view, forcing entire protocols or specifications into one category or another does both the IETF community and the users of the specs a disservice: we should be telling people what we think of a spec, how mature things are, and what the issues are, if necessary on a characteristic-by-characteristic basis, not pretending that assignment of a label communicates significant information. >From that point of view, reducing the number of categories increases the odds of classifications being misleading and communicating little real information, if only from "very likely" to "near-certain". But, again, that is just IMO. john _______________________________________________ Ietf mailing list Ietf@ietf.org https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
