Subject: [openpgp] heads-up: re-chartering the OPENPGP WG

From: Benjamin Kaduk <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2020 14:59:29 -0700

Hi all,

I know there's been occasional mention of it here and there, but I'm about
to begin the official rechartering process for the WG, and I wanted to drop
a note here first so that the resulting email traffic makes sense.  (From
memory, we'll get some state-change messages from the datatracker and then
any IESG discussion on the charter text will be copied to the WG list.)

Please welcome the chairs for the now-in-proposed-state WG,
Daniel Kahn Gillmor and Stephen Farrell!

Looking forward to many successful RFCs :)

-Ben

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From: Ángel <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 02:44:28 +0200

> Looking forward to many successful RFCs :)

Nice to hear! Although I would be happy to see just a few for now :-)

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From: "Derek Atkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2020 20:55:06 -0400

> Nice to hear! Although I would be happy to see just a few for now :-)

This is complete news to me; I have seen no proposed charter sent to this
mailing list.
Did I miss it?

-derek
-- 
       Derek Atkins                 617-623-3745
       [email-masked]             www.ihtfp.com
       Computer and Internet Security Consultant

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From: Ronald Tse <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 00:59:50 +0000

I second Derek’s message here, haven’t seen a proposed charter at the mailing list?

_____________________________________

Ronald Tse
Ribose Inc.

> On Oct 21, 2020, at 8:55 AM, Derek Atkins <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> openpgp mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/openpgp

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 02:20:17 +0100

Hiya,

The draft charter is at [1].

Comments and discussion of that are more than welcome.

From my POV, I'm happy to try help out to get a fairly
minimal bit of progress progressed (as an RFC) - if we can
usefully succeed in that (which isn't a given).

FWIW, I do think starting with a very modest goal is
likely a good plan for now. A bit of success (in terms
of an RFC that is implemented, deployed and more up to
date) is already not that easy, but success does
breed success so if we got that done, then extending
the charter based on success is not so hard.

Cheers,
S.

[1] https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/charter-ietf-openpgp/

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From: Paul Wouters <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2020 21:29:48 -0400 (EDT)

> The draft charter is at [1].

I would remove the "Other work related to OpenPGP" section. One of the
issues in this group has been sudden new items appearing and being
worked on without consensus. Modify the charter after 4880bis is done
to do "other work"

> usefully succeed in that (which isn't a given).

I would say adding at least one more Author/Editor to the bis document
is required to ensure timely and coordinated updates of the draft based
on WG consensus. As part of the last round of openpgp WG not working
seemed to center around a (perceived or real I have no opinion) disconnect
between WG members and draft author.

Paul

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From: Benjamin Kaduk <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2020 18:41:55 -0700

Hi Derek,

> This is complete news to me; I have seen no proposed charter sent to this

To be honest, I'm not sure -- I've had a todo item to get this started for
far longer than I care to admit, and have forgotten where I have (or
haven't) been talking about it.  My apologies if I ended up starting off on
the wrong foot as a result!

In any case, Stephen has already linked to the draft charter text (which
bears a striking resemblance to the charter from the previous iteration of
the WG).  It feels quite natural to me to attempt to recharter as a WG,
since we have seen renewed interest and implementation, and there is this
not-a-WG-draft-but-looks-like-one document that's been getting edits.  The
best end-state for that document is going to be as a published RFC, and I
(and I believe Roman as well) would be most comfortable with it coming
through a WG process.

-Ben

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From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 02:42:01 +0100

Hiya,

> worked on without consensus. Modify the charter after 4880bis is done

Fair point. Be interested if others think similarly.

> between WG members and draft author.

That's probably getting a bit ahead of ourselves but
it's clearly a topic for WG chairs to consider if/when
this becomes a WG again. I can say it's not a surprise
that that be raised, and dealing with it without messing
up too badly will be an important early thing for your
putative WG-chairs to handle;-)

Cheers,
S.

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From: Ronald Tse <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 01:59:59 +0000

Thanks Stephen for sharing the draft charter.

Regarding the “minimal bit of progress” mentioned by Stephen:

Since 4880bis is already in progress and addresses several concerns listed in the draft charter, with individual changes from 4880 discussed and documented with consensus in this mailing list, I assume the best way is to adopt the 4880bis and shepherd it towards publication as the first deliverable of the OpenPGP working group.

on WG consensus.

The current bis document already contains 5 editors, all of whom are active here, representing various implementations. I’m not sure if adding more authors/editors will facilitate "WG consensus”. Consensus is not necessarily universal agreement, as described in RFC 7282.

Kind regards,
Ron

Ronald Tse
Ribose Inc.

On Oct 21, 2020, at 9:29 AM, Paul Wouters <[email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:

Paul

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From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2020 22:07:57 -0400

> Comments and discussion of that are more than welcome.

Thank you.

    > the charter based on success is not so hard.

I'm not opposed to any of the work described.  It's all good.
Asynchronously to it, under the auspices of:

} 1. The work will not unduly delay the closure of the working group after
} the revision is finished (unless the working group is rechartered).

It seems that the key distributions servers suffer from a variety of
ailments.   DDOS attacks, and other privacy issues.

We also have draft-koch-openpgp-webkey-service in the DT,
which sure sounds like webfinger/rfc7033, yet isn't.

I think that there is some spec somewhere (maybe PHB's MMM) about asking for
keys via MIME.

--
Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>   . o O ( IPv6 IøT consulting )
           Sandelman Software Works Inc, Ottawa and Worldwide

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From: Derek Atkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 2020 22:50:55 -0400

Thank you.
I will take a closer look in the morning.

I need to talk with management, but if they approve I am happy to throw my 
hat in the ring as a secondary editor.

-derek
Sent using my mobile device. Please excuse any typos.

---

From: "Derek Atkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 08:01:46 -0400

So... IF I read this right, the plan is to start from RFC4880 and then
re-hash all the discussions we've had in the past decade+ to re-introduce
changes to it?

Or is the plan to start from the current rfc4880bis draft and work from
there to get it across the finish line?

The current wording in the charter leads me to the former and not the
latter process.  Can you please confirm?

Thanks,

-derek

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From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 13:33:06 +0100

Hiya,

> re-hash all the discussions we've had in the past decade+ to re-introduce

Urgh, no:-)

> there to get it across the finish line?

More or less.

There will of course need to be a discussion about WG
adoption of a draft but IIUC the goal will be for that to
basically start from the current bis draft. What I don't
know is whether or not there are parts in the current draft
that a WG would rather not have and how that might affect
people's opinions on adoption. I do believe a WG would want
almost all of the bis text so starting from testing that
(via a WG adoption discussion) seems like a plan to me.
But again, that's getting a bit ahead of ourselves.

> latter process.  Can you please confirm?

Feel free to suggest some words pointing out it's the
latter. (Or I can try later on, if that's better.)

Cheers,
S.

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From: "Derek Atkins" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 08:36:25 -0400

HI,

>> re-hash all the discussions we've had in the past decade+ to

Good to hear.

> latter. (Or I can try later on, if that's better.)

Maybe the simplest way would be to change:

The Working Group will perform the following work:

- Revise RFC4880

to read:

- Revise RFC4880.  The intent is to start from the current rfc4880bis draft.

-derek

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From: Wiktor Kwapisiewicz <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 16:23:12 +0200

Hi Michael,

> which sure sounds like webfinger/rfc7033, yet isn't.

For the record WebFinger was actually considered for WKD. See:
https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/openpgp/6IfUxGRzJbszMP61M3lajZmIZtU/

Kind regards,
Wiktor

-- 
https://metacode.biz/@wiktor

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From: Michael Richardson <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2020 12:58:44 -0400

> re-hash all the discussions we've had in the past decade+ to re-introduce

I think that the WG needs to go through the major diffs and gain consensus.
I don't think we need to follow all the dead ends, etc.  or the
word-smithing.

If there hasn't been any major restructuring of the document, then rfcdiff
ought to do 70% of the work here for us.  Someone just has to chop up what
remains, and generate a slide for each part and attach some motivation.

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From: Daniel Kahn Gillmor <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Oct 2020 02:19:41 -0400

I agree with Stephen that there is a lot in the current draft labeled
rfc4880bis that we should be able to pretty easily document a rough
consensus for, that is in-charter, and has interoperable
implementations.

We do still need to sort out how we clarify which parts meet those
standards, so we can demonstrate that the re-formed WG can produce the
chartered bis in a collaborative and reasonably prompt way.

Looking forward to working with everyone here on this!

    --dkg