Subject: Re: [apps-discuss] Registration policy for the Permanent Message Header Field Names registry

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 21:49:20 -0400

FWIW, +1 to Ned (and Pete and John).  Unless there is a scarcity
issue, the _only_ criterion for registration should be a review
for competence of the description.  It should be a process that
can get feedback to authors along the lines of "this isn't
clear, would you please fix it?" and, when appropriate, notes in
the registry that say "there are multiple definitions for this
keyword even though we only have documentation for some of
them".  But "we like it" or "there is IETF consensus of some
flavor" should not even be on the list.

FWIW, this was approximately the review model for most
registries before IANA moved to ICANN and the IESG decided that
it needed to be in charge for review processes.  We have a
creeping tendency toward every-increasing control going on here
and, especially for registries like this one, we should stop it.

I like the idea of recommending to the ISE that documents be
handed off for expert review, but note that is procedurally no
different from recommending reviewers to the ISE for any other
document topic, recommendations that are always in order and
usually welcome.   More generally, I think that is the right
solution to the current text (and, according to other notes, the
one that is in use): no modification to procedural text
required, IANA makes sure that the Expert has at least looked at
the thing, Expert either signs off on RFCs because they can be
presumed to have gotten adequate review or whines during Last
Call (for the IETF Stream), announcement of intention to publish
(for the IAB and IRTF Streams), and during his or her own review
(for the Independent Stream).  

I'm glad to hear that Graham has the issue under control
because, frankly, any Expert who can't figure out the
relationship between "RFC", especially IETF Stream RFC, and
"adequately reviewed" needs to be fired for general dumbness.

best,
   john

--On Tuesday, September 25, 2012 20:01 -0700 Ned Freed
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>> Applications Area Directors <[email-masked]> wrote:
>> > 
>> > The trouble is that Pete reads RFC 3864 and says that the
>> > words clearly say that all that's required is an RFC, so
>> > the correct policy should be "RFC Required or Expert
>> > Review"... while I read RFC 3864 and say that the intent
>> > was to have a reasonable level of review for the
>> > registrations, that the intended level of review will only
>> > happen with IETF Stream RFCs, and so the correct policy
>> > should be "IETF Review or Expert Review".
> 
>>    Sorry, Barry, I'm with Pete here.
> 
> And so am I. The mistake we make with depressing regularity is
> making our registration processes too onerous, with the
> inevitable result that people just do things without bothering
> to register.
> 
> We really, really, really need to get it through our heads
> that we are not the protocol police and that documentation of
> something does not imply endorsement. A documented bad idea
> can be seen for what it is, whereas an undocumented one can be
> very difficult to grapple with.
>...

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 22:53:15 -0400

> and, especially for registries like this one, we should stop it.

OK, look, John K and everyone: rants about how registration policies
should be are not useful here.  So far, everyone who's commented,
*including me*, agree that we want to make registrations easier in
general.  And the IESG doesn't really *want* to be in the middle of
the review process for registrations, which is why some of us are
pushing document authors to use more lenient registration policies.

This question isn't about how they SHOULD be, but what RFC 3864 says
or meant to say.

And let me remind everyone again that we *already* have nothing more
than Graham's lightweight Expert Review on this registry in all cases.
 What we're talking about here is making it *easier* for RFCs, by
bypassing Expert Review for RFCs, as 3864 seems to clearly specify.
The *only* question is whether *all* RFCs should bypass it, or only
IETF Stream RFCs.

It doesn't help to overreact and tell us that what's wrong with the
world is that we're all trying to make registrations harder.  We're
not.

OK, so there's MY rant.  Ha.

Anyway, it's clear that *everyone* who has commented, including me,
thinks that we *want to* use "RFC Required or Expert Review" -- that
is, that ALL RFCs should bypass Expert Review, assuming to be
adequately reviewed by each stream's process.

But so far only Pete and Ned have said that that's not only what they
*want*, but also what they think RFC 3864 *says* (or intended to say;
Ned says it doesn't matter what was intended, only what's written).

Anyway, tiring of the rants, my inclination is to wrap up this
discussion and say that RFC 3864 does not specify any level of review
for RFCs other than that they be RFCs, so the BCP 26 interpretation
should be "RFC Required or Expert Review".  If Pete agrees that we've
had enough discussion and we're ready to tell IANA, we will tell IANA
and ask them to change the registry policy.

Barry

[When did it happen that one could no longer post a question and have
a gentle discussion, without rants, accusations, and generally
excessive grumpiness?  Oh, my, well... that's another rant, for
another time.]

---

From: Ned Freed <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 19:43:11 -0700 (PDT)

> for competence of the description.

I want to emphasize this, because it is incredibly important.

The *description* needs to be competent. The underlying technology does not. In
fact the cases where the underlying technology is obscure or outright crap are
the ones that are most important to document, because otherwise they can be
incredibly difficult to figure out.

Decent technology tends to be self-explanatory, even when it's misapplied or
misused. The syntax and semantics of a lot of nonstandard headers is obvious
from inspection even when they don't actually accomplish their intended goal.
But some others ... the other day I ran into one with an opaque name that was a
series of base64 sections. On a whim I decoded it, and it's BER inside. Good
thing I didn't need to understand it, because good luck doing so without a
description.

				Ned

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 20:58:10 -0600

On 9/26/12 8:53 PM, Barry Leiba wrote:

[rants elided]

> Anyway, it's clear that *everyone* who has commented, including
> me, thinks that we *want to* use "RFC Required or Expert Review" --
> that is, that ALL RFCs should bypass Expert Review, assuming to be 
> But so far only Pete and Ned have said that that's not only what
> they *want*, but also what they think RFC 3864 *says* (or intended
> to say; Ned says it doesn't matter what was intended, only what's
> written).
> 
> discussion and say that RFC 3864 does not specify any level of
> review for RFCs other than that they be RFCs, so the BCP 26
> interpretation should be "RFC Required or Expert Review".  If Pete
> agrees that we've had enough discussion and we're ready to tell
> IANA, we will tell IANA and ask them to change the registry
> policy.

I think Section 4.3 of RFC 3864 implies "RFC Required or Expert
Review". The first bullet point there covers "RFC Required" and the
second one covers "Expert Review". IMHO.

Peter

- -- 
Peter Saint-Andre
https://stpeter.im/

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 23:37:48 -0400

--On Wednesday, September 26, 2012 22:53 -0400 Barry Leiba
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> And let me remind everyone again that we *already* have
> nothing more than Graham's lightweight Expert Review on this
> registry in all cases.  What we're talking about here is
> making it *easier* for RFCs, by bypassing Expert Review for
> RFCs, as 3864 seems to clearly specify. The *only* question is
> whether *all* RFCs should bypass it, or only IETF Stream RFCs.
> 
> It doesn't help to overreact and tell us that what's wrong
> with the world is that we're all trying to make registrations
> harder.  We're not.

Barry, while my message may have been too long for you to get to
the part of my message that addressed the above, I think I did
answer your question.

IMO, 

(1) 3864 doesn't say "if you have an RFC, expert review is
completely unnecessary".  The language and cases are certainly
confusing, but I can't get to "no expert".

(2) Regardless of (1), it doesn't say "some RFCs are more equal
than others".

(3) At the risk of getting back into the "rant" area, the
problem with treating "have an RFC" as an alternative to Expert
Review is that, even in the IETF Stream, a registration of a
header type that is semi-buried in a document that is mostly
about something else may not get the quality of review that a
definition in a document whose sole purpose was to define that
header field would.  In that context, it is probably useful to
remember that, while we have two Apps ADs at the moment who are
both email experts who have enough knowledge to do reviews like
this themselves, we are not guaranteed that and could easily end
up in a situation where we had zero ADs with that level of
qualification and interest.

(4) So I believe that, if Expert Review is specified, all such
registrations ought to be passed by the Expert, independent of
Stream.  I believe the language in 3854 is consistent with that.
If it is, instead, merely ambiguous or subject to multiple
interpretations, I think it is in the interest of the community
to interpret it that way.   And, if an Expert ever starts
blocking registrations from RFCs that have been carefully
reviewed for registration application competency, then the IESG
needs to correct or fire said Expert.

    john

---

From: Graham Klyne <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Sep 2012 10:47:21 +0100

Ned,

re. "The *description* needs to be competent."

I think you make a very important observation here, and one that maybe has not 
been sufficiently emphasized.  I shall try to keep this more firmly in mind when 
I undertake future reviews.

Mark,

Is this maybe something to incorporate into your "custodian" draft (sorry, I 
forget the exact term you used)?

#g
--

On 27/09/2012 03:43, Ned Freed wrote:
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