Subject: [appsdir] Mailing list to discuss about Applications Area Directorate reviews

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 11:58:07 -0700

Hello,

[Bcc to apps-discuss.  Please follow up on appsdir@]

The Applications Area Review Team has been posting reviews to 
apps-discuss@ since October 2009.  The Applications Area Directorate 
continued the practice as the objective is to allow open discussion 
of the reviews.  As a reminder, the comments in the reviews do not 
bear more weight than comments submitted by an individual during a 
Last Call.  The directorate also perform early reviews, i.e. reviews 
before a last Call is issued, so that there is more time to address the issues.

Apps-discuss@ is also used by APPSAWG.  The work in that working 
group generates a significant amount of mail traffic.  When combined 
with the APPSDIR-related traffic, it turns in a somewhat high volume 
of mail and it may hamper the work of APPSAWG.

It was suggested to me that APPSDIR reviews should be discussed on a 
different mailing list.  In my opinion, it is important that APPSDIR 
continues the practice of encouraging open discussion of the 
reviews.  I would like to suggest that APPSDIR reviews be posted to 
[email-masked] as from June 1, 2012.  This is an administrative 
decision for the directorate to take.  Feedback from apps-discuss@ 
will be taken into consideration.  The Applications Area Directors, 
as usual, have the final say.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy

---

From: "Murray S. Kucherawy" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 19:25:34 +0000

I appreciate the suggestion to de-clutter apps-discuss as much as possible.

I suggest reviews be posted to [email-masked] for the sake of sharing among the team and archiving; to [email-masked] for general dissemination; and to the working group list (if applicable) and the [email-masked] alias.  Barry and/or Pete could comment on whether including [email-masked] in that list is appropriate.

-MSK

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 20:28:47 +0100

You think that'll generate *less* traffic? I doubt it;-)

And I suspect that most of the folks on apps-discuss
who're involved in most of those discussions are also
on [email-masked] so very few people will see less
mail and most will see more.

I'd say if you're gonna do this, do it for a trial
period only. Maybe June 1 - after IETF-84 and then see
how its gone.

S

On 05/17/2012 07:58 PM, S Moonesamy wrote:
> continued the practice as the objective is to allow open discussion of
> the reviews.  As a reminder, the comments in the reviews do not bear
> more weight than comments submitted by an individual during a Last
> Call.  The directorate also perform early reviews, i.e. reviews before a
> last Call is issued, so that there is more time to address the issues.
> 
> Apps-discuss@ is also used by APPSAWG.  The work in that working group
> generates a significant amount of mail traffic.  When combined with the
> APPSDIR-related traffic, it turns in a somewhat high volume of mail and
> it may hamper the work of APPSAWG.
> 
> continues the practice of encouraging open discussion of the reviews.  I
> would like to suggest that APPSDIR reviews be posted to [email-masked] as
> from June 1, 2012.  This is an administrative decision for the
> directorate to take.  Feedback from apps-discuss@ will be taken into
> consideration.  The Applications Area Directors, as usual, have the
> final say.
> 
> Regards,
> S. Moonesamy
> 
> _______________________________________________
> apps-discuss mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/apps-discuss

---

From: Tony Hansen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 16:07:42 -0400

I think this will increase the overall mail flow rather than decrease it.

-1

     Tony Hansen

On 5/17/2012 2:58 PM, S Moonesamy wrote:
> Call.  The directorate also perform early reviews, i.e. reviews before 
> a last Call is issued, so that there is more time to address the issues.
>
> generates a significant amount of mail traffic.  When combined with 
> the APPSDIR-related traffic, it turns in a somewhat high volume of 
> mail and it may hamper the work of APPSAWG.
>
> continues the practice of encouraging open discussion of the reviews.  
> I would like to suggest that APPSDIR reviews be posted to 
> will be taken into consideration.  The Applications Area Directors, as 
> usual, have the final say.
>
> Regards,
> S. Moonesamy

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 13:07:20 -0700

Hi Murray,
At 12:25 17-05-2012, Murray S. Kucherawy wrote:
>I suggest reviews be posted to [email-masked] for the sake of 
>sharing among the team and archiving; to [email-masked] for general 
>dissemination; and to the working group list (if applicable) and the 
>[email-masked] alias.  Barry and/or Pete could comment on 
>whether including [email-masked] in that list is appropriate.

I have been trying to reduce the number of emails to appsdir@ so that 
people can keep up with my administrative clutter.  We can always 
discuss some APPSDIR reviews on this mailing list if anyone brings up 
the topic in here.  We already send the reviews to the 
[email-masked] alias (which is expanded to the email address 
of the authors).  It's going to be a little more work identify the 
reviews on ietf@ (your point about archiving).

In general, we copy the review to iesg@ if a Last Call has been 
issued or if there is anything significant.  I'll ask whether we 
should drop that to avoid duplication.

Best regards,
-sm

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 12:50:49 -0700

Hi Stephen,
>You think that'll generate *less* traffic? I doubt it;-)

I think that it will generate less traffic for apps-discuss@.  Now, 
if you ask me about ietf@, I'll say that I am not the moderator of 
that mailing list. :-)  FWIW, APPSDIR does around 15 reviews a 
month.  I expect around 50 more emails to the list if the reviews are 
not controversial.

I saw a Secdir review by Stephen Hanna which was really good.  I 
would not have read it if it wasn't posted to ietf@.

>mail and most will see more.

Yes.  It less cumbersome in terms of moderation though as it is 
difficult to say that topic X does not belong to apps-discuss@.

>period only. Maybe June 1 - after IETF-84 and then see

That's a good idea.

Best regards,
-sm

---

From: "Murray S. Kucherawy" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 21:19:28 +0000

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of SM
> Sent: Thursday, May 17, 2012 1:07 PM
> To: [email-masked]
> Subject: Re: [appsdir] Mailing list to discuss about Applications Area Directorate reviews
> 
> the topic in here.  We already send the reviews to the draft-
> [email-masked] alias (which is expanded to the email address of the
> authors).  It's going to be a little more work identify the reviews on
> ietf@ (your point about archiving).

I can spot appsdir reviews on ietf@ just fine right now because they all start with "Applications Area Directorate Review of" or "AppsDir Review of" or something like that.

I guess my vision of this list is that it's used to make/discuss assignments, receive the reviews so the team can see them all as they come in, and discuss operation of the directorate itself.  Those collectively don't seem to be too voluminous to me.

> In general, we copy the review to iesg@ if a Last Call has been issued
> or if there is anything significant.  I'll ask whether we should drop
> that to avoid duplication.

That seems reasonable.  Or perhaps just [email-masked], though they're on this list anyway.

-MSK

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 16:25:27 -0400

On Thu, May 17, 2012 at 11:58:07AM -0700, S Moonesamy wrote:
> different mailing list.

I am mystified by the desire around the IETF these days to split every
topic of broad interest and every discussion aimed at wide review off
onto its own mailing list.  The _whole point_ of having things like
area-wide mailing lists is so that things of importance to the entire
area can be discussed there.  If these APPSDIR reviews aren't really
appropriate for the entire area, why is APPSDIR doing the review at
all (except to say, "This has no implications for the APPSDIR")?  The
reasoning always seems to be traffic to the mailing list.  But if the
point of the IETF is wide review, then largeish amounts of mailing
list traffic are a cost of doing business.

So, FWIW, I am not in favour of this suggestion.

Best,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: Mark Nottingham <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 May 2012 10:10:34 +1000

I'm +1 in principle - it may end up with some people with more bits of mail in their boxes, but the apps-discuss list is overloaded, and it's getting to the point where it's requires a *lot* of dedication to keep up with it. That may work for a few highly active people, but not for the community as a whole.

Now, I'm not sure that using ietf@ -- which has a broader audience as well as a volume problem of its own (so much so that I don't pay attention to it regularly, but that's a different discussion) -- is the right solution. It may be that using a different list (e.g., appsdir@) would be better. 

Cheers,

On 18/05/2012, at 4:58 AM, S Moonesamy wrote:

> The Applications Area Review Team has been posting reviews to apps-discuss@ since October 2009.  The Applications Area Directorate continued the practice as the objective is to allow open discussion of the reviews.  As a reminder, the comments in the reviews do not bear more weight than comments submitted by an individual during a Last Call.  The directorate also perform early reviews, i.e. reviews before a last Call is issued, so that there is more time to address the issues.
> 
> Apps-discuss@ is also used by APPSAWG.  The work in that working group generates a significant amount of mail traffic.  When combined with the APPSDIR-related traffic, it turns in a somewhat high volume of mail and it may hamper the work of APPSAWG.
> 
> It was suggested to me that APPSDIR reviews should be discussed on a different mailing list.  In my opinion, it is important that APPSDIR continues the practice of encouraging open discussion of the reviews.  I would like to suggest that APPSDIR reviews be posted to [email-masked] as from June 1, 2012.  This is an administrative decision for the directorate to take.  Feedback from apps-discuss@ will be taken into consideration.  The Applications Area Directors, as usual, have the final say.
> 
> Regards,
> S. Moonesamy
> 
> appsdir mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/appsdir

--
Mark Nottingham   http://www.mnot.net/

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 20:14:25 -0400

Short answer: I am very much against the idea of moving apps-related
discussions off of apps-discuss.

Longer answer:
I haven't talked with Pete about this, so these are just my own thoughts.

Apps-discuss was set up for general apps-related discussions, and
became the place to discuss Apps Review Team, now Apps Directorate,
reviews.  I'm the one who's responsible for the use of apps-discuss as
the AppsAWG mailing list as well, and I did that because I think it's
important to keep as much of the area-related discussion in the same
place, on one list, so more people are likely to be there for it.  The
more we split the discussions up, the more likely it is that people
will pick and choose, won't subscribe to all of them, and will miss
things.  We'll end up with some combination of (1) a bunch of lists,
none of which have all the right people, and (2) a lot of
cross-posting to more than one of the lists.  That serves no one.

I'm also responsible for having suggested the current distribution
list for AppDir reviews, which is
- [email-masked]
- [email-masked]
- [email-masked] if these are last call comments or the discussion is
during IESG Evaluation
- the WG mailing list if it's a working group document and the review
calls out things of significance

I like that distribution, and I'd rather keep it that way.  That said,
I encourage people to remove the IESG list if the discussion of a
review starts to go off into different directions (as the DANE
discussion did).  Use judgment here.

I do NOT think that the volume of messages is a "problem".  As Andrew
says, when an interested community has to review a bunch of things,
the mailing list traffic that generates is necessary traffic.  There
are lots of email programs out there that help one deal with
relatively high volume lists -- use filtering and threading, and stay
sane.  If we try to stop people from missing what they ought to be
seeing by reducing the volume, we will make them miss what they ought
to be seeing by eliminating it, or by moving it somewhere they're not
looking.

Barry

---

From: Peter Saint-Andre <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 20:23:42 -0600

> discussions off of apps-discuss.

I agree with Barry: I see no reason to move discussion of reviews off
the apps-discuss list.

Peter

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

---

From: Tobias Gondrom <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 May 2012 10:49:56 +0800

> I agree with Barry: I see no reason to move discussion of reviews off

I agree with Peter and Barry.
Best regards, Tobias

Ps.: on a note: like we do at sec-dir, depending on the judgement of the 
reviewer, for last call reviews of wider impact or that require broader 
attention it can make sense to also add ietf to the recipients on an 
individual case basis.

---

From: Alexey Melnikov <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 20:39:30 -0700

> I agree with Barry: I see no reason to move discussion of reviews off

My preferences:
1) don't move AppsDir reviews from apps-discuss (+1 to Barry/Peter)
2) if AppsDir discussions move, then I don't think ietf@ is the right place, due to the level of noise/traffic there.

Regards,
Alexey

---

From: Alexey Melnikov <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 20:44:36 -0700

Hi SM,

On 17 May 2012, at 13:07, SM <[email-masked]> wrote:

> I have been trying to reduce the number of emails to appsdir@ so that people can keep up with my administrative clutter.  We can always discuss some APPSDIR reviews on this mailing list if anyone brings up the topic in here.  We already send the reviews to the [email-masked] alias (which is expanded to the email address of the authors).  It's going to be a little more work identify the reviews on ietf@ (your point about archiving).
> 
> In general, we copy the review to iesg@ if a Last Call has been issued or if there is anything significant.  I'll ask whether we should drop that to avoid duplication.

When I was on IESG I actually appreciated seeing directorate reviews. I also picked up good points from such reviews to use in Discusses, even if they weren't from AppsDir reviews. So I think CCing iesg@ is important.

---

From: "Martin J. Dürst" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 May 2012 15:37:03 +0900

> I'm +1 in principle - it may end up with some people with more bits of mail in their boxes, but the apps-discuss list is overloaded, and it's getting to the point where it's requires a *lot* of ded…

I'm with Barry, Peter,... on this. I agree with Mark that apps-discuss 
has too much traffic, but splitting it up I'm afraid will just lead to 
two bloated mailing lists instead of one, with even more mail :-(.

Regards,   Martin.

---

From: Claudio Allocchio <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 May 2012 10:25:37 +0200 (CEST)

>> I agree with Barry: I see no reason to move discussion of reviews off

the fact that we have lots of emails on apps-discuss if because we do a 
lot of work... :-)

and +1, there is NO valid reason to move it from apps-discuss to ietf: it 
will become worst.

> 2) if AppsDir discussions move, then I don't think ietf@ is the right place, due to the level of noise/traffic there.

same for me.

> Alexey

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Claudio Allocchio             G   A   R   R          [email-masked]
                         Senior Technical Officer
tel: +39 040 3758523      Italian Academic and       G=Claudio; S=Allocchio;
fax: +39 040 3758565        Research Network         P=garr; A=garr; C=it;

            PGP Key: http://www.cert.garr.it/PGP/keys.php3#ca

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 May 2012 14:54:51 -0400

--On Thursday, May 17, 2012 11:58 -0700 S Moonesamy
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> apps-discuss@ since October 2009.  The Applications Area
> Directorate continued the practice as the objective is to
> allow open discussion of the reviews.  As a reminder, the
> comments in the reviews do not bear more weight than comments
> submitted by an individual during a Last Call.  The
> directorate also perform early reviews, i.e. reviews before a
>...

FWIW, +1.  I've been overwhelmed by the traffic level that
results from mixing the reviews, active discussions of documents
accepted as WG topics, and semi-random "I'd like the AppsArea to
discuss my latest plan for making Vern's list [1] or its web
equivalent" notes and discussion threads and sometimes just find
myself deferring looking at the list for days, then giving up
and deleting everything on the theory that it is OBE.  At least
for those of us with limited time, Barry's notion that we should
"keep as much of the area-related discussion in the same place,
on one list" works well as long as everyone doing work in the
Area has unlimited time for reading a large, and
seemingly-growing, amount of traffic.  Unless I'm the only one
who lacks unlimited time for IETF work and who tries to follow
IETF-related efforts other than the AppsArea, for the rest of us
"everything on one list" turns into a three-way choice among:

	-- trying to filter the list by subject/topic, risking
	missing important things because Subject lines are often
	not helpful.
	
	-- trying to filter the list in other ways (e.g., read
	only a few days a week and discard everything else),
	again risking missing something important.
	
	-- conclude that none of it is really important enough
	to justify the cost of the filtering and either
	unsubscribe or divert list traffic to what turns out to
	be the equivalent of /dev/null

<rant> The assumption that, by putting as much traffic as
possible onto a single list, everyone who is interested in any
aspect of that list will read it is one of the several things
that drives IETF ever closer to unintentionally replicating the
experience of SDOs we criticize for having leadership in the
development and approval processes in the hands of people whose
jobs are standardization, not protocol design, development,
implementation, and deployment [2].  I am not criticizing those
who manage to do standardization jobs but who also have a strong
history in design and implementation of real products, but I
think there is a tendency to forgot those who need to squeeze
IETF work in despite its having lower institutional priority
that other work.  That particular tendency is potentially very
destructive for the IETF and the IETF way of doing things and,
IMO, we need to be vigilant about it. </rant>

    john

[1] http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/you-might-be.html

[2] Not a concept I made up.  Chapter 16 of Marshall Rose's _The
Open Book_ contains a rather nice 1990 explanation of the
problem.  I sometimes fear that much of what we have learned in
22 years is how to become the problem.

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 May 2012 17:26:53 -0400

> seemingly-growing, amount of traffic.

No, not really.  I actually agree with you that conceptually, it's
better to split things by topic, so that people who're interested in
email but not web stuff, for example, can have things sorted out for
them, and the sane people can leave the internationalization stuff for
the crazies.  The problem is that I don't see how it's workable.
You're saying that *you* can't readily do the triage of {stuff I have
to see}, {stuff I'm interested in}, {stuff I don't care about}, but
then you're sort of asking *us* (for some value of "us") to do it for
you by splitting the lists.  Surely, our filtering will be worse for
you than yours will, and even if we should happen to hit your
situation spot on, we'll be screwing up horridly for other folks.

Suppose we split all this mess into (1) AppsDir reviews, (2)
email-related discussions, (3) web-related discussions, (4)
internationalization-related discussions, and (5) other.  What happens
when someone wants to talk about internationalizing webmail?  Does
that go in 2 and 4?  2, 3, and 4?  Does that mean that people who are
subscribed to email and web and have suboptimal filters have to see
all this stuff twice because it's cross-posted?  What happens when
there's an AppsDir review of a document related to web... does the
review go in both lists, 1 and 3?  And so on.

And when someone guesses wrong and posts something that would be in
your "have to see" set to a list to which you aren't subscribed, you
don't get the chance to glance at the subject line and decide to have
a look inside.  If it's all on one list, you can at least scan the
subject lines and make a guess at what you can trash wholesale.  It
might be wrong sometimes, when the subject lines are inaccurate or
worse.  But it's a start.

Of course, we've already separated out (or tried to) the App stuff
from, say, Sec and Ops and Rtg, and so on... and I'm not suggesting
that we put all that together just in case (where do discussions go
that have to do with web security?).  So we can certainly argue for
more granular segregation.  But do you really think that separating
AppsDir reviews from the rest of the Apps-Discuss traffic will help
most people and will be sufficient?

Barry

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 19 May 2012 14:51:33 -0700

Hello,

[Cc to people who are not subscribed to appsdir@.  See 
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/appsdir/current/maillist.html 
for all the comments]

Barry, Apps AD, mentioned that he is "very much against the idea of 
moving apps-related discussions off of apps-discuss".  Please refer 
to http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/appsdir/current/msg00940.html 
for the entire message posted by Barry.

APPSDIR reviews will continue to be sent to app-discuss@ as usual as 
I cannot make such a change without the approval of Barry or Pete.

Best regards,
-sm

---

From: Mark Nottingham <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 May 2012 21:41:16 +1000

I understand that there's a rationale for this, but the simple truth is that I'm in the same boat as John - too much e-mail, not enough time, so things get "filtered." 

When they're all on the same list, it's a manual process, which is more error-prone, and it means that everything has to be sorted manually *first*, something that I put off, resulting in delays.

When they're separate lists, the sorting step is automatic (thanks, sieve), and I can pay more immediate attention to the higher priority ones.

Yes, I get duplicate e-mails; oh well.

As it is, the apps-discuss list is starting to remind me of the HTML5 experience; a place where only the really dedicated can participate, because it's a broad firehose.

BTW, I'm curious; LC announcements ask for comments to be sent to ietf@, yet we send appsdir to iesg@. Why the difference?

---

From: Barry Leiba <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 May 2012 11:57:00 -0400

SM said:
> Barry, Apps AD, mentioned that he is "very much against the idea of moving
> apps-related discussions off of apps-discuss".  Please refer to
> http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/appsdir/current/msg00940.html for the
> entire message posted by Barry.

Well, now, what my preference, even a strong one, is doesn't amount to
edict.  If I decide unilaterally that we'll go one way, and that
causes us to lost a good bit of participation and attention from some
people we rely on for reviews and comments, that's clearly not in our
collective benefit.

Mark said:
> I understand that there's a rationale for this, but the simple truth is that I'm in
> the same boat as John - too much e-mail, not enough time, so things get "filtered."
>
> When they're all on the same list, it's a manual process, which is more error-prone,
> and it means that everything has to be sorted manually *first*, something that I put
> off, resulting in delays.
>
> When they're separate lists, the sorting step is automatic (thanks, sieve), and I can
> pay more immediate attention to the higher priority ones.

OK.  But neither you nor John gave a clue about how you'd like the see
the lists sorted.  Is it sufficient to just separate the AppsDir
reviews from the rest?  Would you also want to separate the AppsAWG
work out to another list?  Or is it important to also also separate
the general apps-discuss stuff by topic?

Let me suggest a few arrangements, and get opinions (and I agree that
we aren't posting our "last call" comment to the ietf list, and we
probably should):

Arrangement 1a:
AppsAWG and general Apps discussion stay on apps-discuss.
AppsDir reviews go to authors with CC to [email-masked], and NOT to apps-discuss.

Arrangement 1b:
AppsAWG and general Apps discussion stay on apps-discuss.
AppsDir reviews go to authors with CC to [email-masked], and ALSO to a
new list (resurrect the name apps-review).

Arrangements 2a and 2b:
AppsAWG gets a new apps-area-wg mailing list.
General Apps discussion stays on apps-discuss.
AppsDir reviews as in 1a and 1b.

Arrangements 3a and 3b:
AppsAWG gets a new apps-area-wg mailing list.
General Apps discussion is divided in 3 or 4 mailing lists by broad topics.
AppsDir reviews as in 1a and 1b.

If you choose one of arrangements 3, please say how you would see the
general apps discussion divided.  And, of course, suggest another
specific arrangement if you have one.

I'll note that Andrew has specifically opined that the AppsDir reviews
DO belong with the general apps discussion... why are we bothering to
do apps reviews, he asks, if the reviews aren't of interest to the
apps area?

Barry

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 May 2012 13:18:12 -0400

Barry,

My apologies for slow turn-around in this discussion.  It would
be reasonable for you to consider it a symptom of the problem
I'm concerned about.

--On Saturday, May 19, 2012 17:26 -0400 Barry Leiba
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>> results from mixing the reviews, active discussions of
>> documents accepted as WG topics, and semi-random "I'd like
>> the AppsArea to discuss my latest plan for making Vern's list
>> [1] or its web equivalent" notes and discussion threads and
>> sometimes just find myself deferring looking at the list for
>> days, then giving up and deleting everything on the theory
>> that it is OBE.  At least for those of us with limited time,
>> Barry's notion that we should "keep as much of the
>> area-related discussion in the same place, on one list" works
>> well as long as everyone doing work in the Area has unlimited
>> time for reading a large, and
 
> No, not really.  I actually agree with you that conceptually,
> it's better to split things by topic, so that people who're
> interested in email but not web stuff, for example, can have
> things sorted out for them, and the sane people can leave the
> internationalization stuff for the crazies.  The problem is
> that I don't see how it's workable. You're saying that *you*
> can't readily do the triage of {stuff I have to see}, {stuff
> I'm interested in}, {stuff I don't care about}, but then
> you're sort of asking *us* (for some value of "us") to do it
> for you by splitting the lists.  Surely, our filtering will be
> worse for you than yours will, and even if we should happen to
> hit your situation spot on, we'll be screwing up horridly for
> other folks.

Ok, that is fair.  But...

First of all, that is why we traditionally create WGs for such
purposes, rather than trying to do a large fraction of the
IETF's work in some highly aggregated "area working group".  It
is also why long-lived area WGs have often worked better than
they do in Apps, precisely because the area is so much more
diverse -- contains so many very different topic specialities --
than others.

And...

> internationalization-related discussions, and (5) other.  What
> happens when someone wants to talk about internationalizing
> webmail?  Does that go in 2 and 4?  2, 3, and 4?  Does that
> mean that people who are subscribed to email and web and have
> suboptimal filters have to see all this stuff twice because
> it's cross-posted?  What happens when there's an AppsDir
> review of a document related to web... does the review go in
> both lists, 1 and 3?  And so on.

I didn't suggest splitting out (2), (3), and (4) or even (5).
Yes, it seems tempting, but I recognize exactly the issues you
point out.  But contrast this situation with a normal WG in
which there are issues that are on-topic and ones that aren't, a
charter to delimit the difference, and a range of options for
dealing with extraneous traffic starting with "whine at the
Chair".  Here, there appears to be no real charter limits other
than "possibly an application" so we have discussions not only
of documents that have been agreed to as topics for
consideration but (sometimes very long) discussions of documents
that someone thinks the Apps Area should look at some day.  If
the authors of such documents were forced into a WG context,
they, and those interested in developing a proposal, would
probably not be discussing either a draft charter or specific
documents on the main list.  

Similarly, a directorate list has been used from time to time in
this Area to discuss strategic topics but rarely the details of
particular documents.  Whether a list should exist for that
purpose really is up to you and Pete unilaterally -- by
selecting you as ADs, the community gave you a lot of discretion
about Area management which I think the rest of us should
respect unless things got really out of hand (something I
consider thoroughly unlikely with the two of you). But we are
now using that list for strategy (very rarely), for
administrative assignments for reviews, and a lot of other
traffic.  And reviews of documents that may have nothing
directly to do with the Applications Area gets posted to the
Area list (specific suggestion about that below).

> And when someone guesses wrong and posts something that would
> be in your "have to see" set to a list to which you aren't
> subscribed, you don't get the chance to glance at the subject
> line and decide to have a look inside.  If it's all on one
> list, you can at least scan the subject lines and make a guess
> at what you can trash wholesale.  It might be wrong sometimes,
> when the subject lines are inaccurate or worse.  But it's a
> start.

Sure.  On the other hand, if you/we really wanted to optimize
that, we'd pay a lot more attention to subject lines in the
knowledge that, in practice, very long ones get truncated in a
lot of MUAs.  If all I see in  the subject line is "Re:
[apps-discuss] APPSDIR review of" (and I think there was a
subthread recently in which that actually was the subject line),
then glancing at the subject line is of almost no value in
making an intelligent decision about what to do about the
message.

> Of course, we've already separated out (or tried to) the App
> stuff from, say, Sec and Ops and Rtg, and so on...

But, when a review of a protocol with absolutely no
Applications-specific implications is posted to the Apps list,
work in those other areas is _not_ separated out.

>  and I'm not
> suggesting that we put all that together just in case (where
> do discussions go that have to do with web security?).  So we
> can certainly argue for more granular segregation.  But do you
> really think that separating AppsDir reviews from the rest of
> the Apps-Discuss traffic will help most people and will be
> sufficient?

Ok, specific suggestion for your consideration, mostly to
illustrate that there are other alternatives:

(1) Reviews of work in other Areas are not posted to the
Apps-Discuss list unless either the reviewer or the review team
leadership can identify reasons why the specification in
question has specific Applications implications that the rest of
us should know about.  Those decisions won't be perfect, but...

(2) Reviews or other discussions of work in Apps Area WGs are
not posted to the Apps-Discuss list.  That is what we have WGs
for and people who are materially concerned with the work of a
given WG should be on that WG's list.  Since we don't do an Area
Last Call between the usual WG LC and IETF LC, I think WG Chairs
and/or relevant ADs should be encouraged to post a note to the
Apps-Discuss list announcing a WG Last Call or upcoming critical
decision (much as they might make an announcement at a f2f
AppsArea meeting) but I think that ought to be discretionary
(there is always IETF LC if someone makes the wrong decision)
and that any subsequent discussion should go to the WG list.  

(3) Preliminary reviews (prior to IETF LC) of documents being
worked on in WGs in the Applications Area should be copied
_only_ to the WG list.  Those reviews can be immensely useful
but, if they are copied to the Apps-Discuss list, they become
clutter for those who aren't interested in the WG's work and
duplicates for those who are.  Worse, we inevitably end up with
follow-up messages on the WG list, on the Apps-Discuss list, and
with copies to both.  Keeping track of all of the relevant
comments then becomes unnecessary extra work for WG [Co-]Chairs
and others and, noting that the Apps-Discuss list is not an
appeal forum for WG actions, provides almost no extra value.

(4) We should keep reviewing whether there are clusters of
related proposals that really ought to be handled in a
topic-specific WG with a real charter.  I know there is a
problem getting WGs, especially WGs that people are not
absolutely sure about, chartered with a reasonable amount of
effort.  But, if that problem is significant enough, let's solve
it rather than using AppsAWG to work around it.  And, while it
saddens me to say this, if there isn't sufficient interest and
critical mass to keep a WG and its documents alive, then there
isn't sufficient interest.  We shouldn't say "well, we can do it
in the AppsAWG because there are a lot of people on its mailing
list": if those people aren't contributing or aren't experts,
then the larger list doesn't help and may actually create a
false impression about informed consensus.

I think those four measures would reduce the amount of
extraneous traffic considerably and might have side-benefits of
making WGs easier to manage and monitor.  

best,
    john

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 May 2012 11:31:08 -0700

Hello,
>people we rely on for reviews and comments, that's clearly not in our

I don't read what Barry said as an edict.  As this was an informal 
discussion I gave the short answer.  Stephen Farrell is Security 
AD.  If I am taking an action which will generate more traffic  on 
ietf@, I will give more weight to his views.  The alternative is to 
ask Stephen to talk to Barry and Pete and for them to talk to me.

There has been feedback from APPSDIR and from two apps-discuss@ 
subscribers.  The general sense I got from the discussion was not to 
do the change.  It would been the same even without Barry's preference.

At 04:41 20-05-2012, Mark Nottingham wrote:
>BTW, I'm curious; LC announcements ask for comments to be sent to 
>ietf@, yet we send appsdir to iesg@. Why the difference?

The Apps Area Review Team used to send its reviews to apps-discuss@ 
and authors only.  An Area Director outside Apps Area mentioned that 
he was interested in reading the reviews.  The reviews are copied to 
iesg@ because of that.  The Directorate also performs early 
reviews.  I did not suggest adding iesg@ for such cases as it is 
better that APPSDIR reviews receive attention when input is requested 
for the decision (Last Call).

BTW, if we send APPSDIR reviews to ietf@ with a copy to 
apps-discuss@, we can expect many more threads like the DANE thread.

Best regards,
-sm

---

From: Mark Nottingham <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 09:00:56 +1000

> specific arrangement if you have one.

I'm OK with any of these. I don't think the general discussion needs to be divided.

Thanks,

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 May 2012 20:01:21 -0400

--On Sunday, May 20, 2012 11:57 -0400 Barry Leiba
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> Let me suggest a few arrangements, and get opinions (and I
> agree that we aren't posting our "last call" comment to the
> ietf list, and we probably should):
> 
> Arrangement 1a:
> AppsDir reviews go to authors with CC to [email-masked], and
> ALSO to a new list (resurrect the name apps-review).
> 
> Arrangements 2a and 2b:
> General Apps discussion is divided in 3 or 4 mailing lists by
> broad topics. AppsDir reviews as in 1a and 1b.
> 
> If you choose one of arrangements 3, please say how you would
> see the general apps discussion divided.  And, of course,
> suggest another specific arrangement if you have one.

I don't have a strong preference among 1a/1b/2a/2b, although I'd
made different decisions about what I need to be subscribed to
for different of them.  I think 3a/3b would be more trouble than
they are worth for the reasons you gave and I responded to in
earlier notes.

> I'll note that Andrew has specifically opined that the AppsDir
> reviews DO belong with the general apps discussion... why are
> we bothering to do apps reviews, he asks, if the reviews
> aren't of interest to the apps area?

Personal response/ reaction: the purpose of an an Apps Area
review and review team is to make certain that someone with an
applications perspective takes a careful look at the document.
It isn't to get some sort of Area consensus on the document: if
it were, not only would different procedures be appropriate, but
the "just another LC review" disclaimer would be wrong.  If
nothing else, I'd expect an Area Consensus review to force a
DISCUSS, probably subject to appears and/or recall if it didn't
occur, from both Apps ADs.  I don't think we want to go anywhere
near there.

If the team reviews really are individual reviews on a "make
sure someone from the area takes a careful look" basis, then
those reviews that are associated with IETF LC need to be copied
to authors (and probably the relevant WG is there is one) and
the IETF-discuss list because that is normal procedure.  There
is no more special reason to copy any Apps Area discussion list
unless the ADs would like to recommend/request that _any_ review
or comments by folks who participate in Apps Area work during
IETF Last Call be copied to that list.

I've already explained why I believe that preliminary reviews
(prior to IETF or even WG LC) should be copied to the relevant
WG list only.  Such reviews on true individual submissions might
be a different story, but I think they are a special case
relative to the rest of this discussion.

   john

---

From: Mark Nottingham <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 10:05:34 +1000

> IETF Last Call be copied to that list.

+1

--
Mark Nottingham
http://www.mnot.net/

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 May 2012 22:50:03 -0400

--On Monday, May 21, 2012 10:05 +1000 Mark Nottingham
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>> those reviews that are associated with IETF LC need to be
>> copied to authors (and probably the relevant WG is there is
>> one) and the IETF-discuss list because that is normal
>> procedure.  There is no more special reason to copy any Apps
>> Area discussion list unless the ADs would like to
>> recommend/request that _any_ review or comments by folks who
>> participate in Apps Area work during IETF Last Call be copied
>> to that list.
> 
> +1

Additional thought: because of the same extreme diversity in the
area that prevents breaking AppsAWG work up into little subject
matter pieces, I don't think that would be wise to implement
but, as something else to think about..   if the purpose of an
Apps Area Review is to be sure that someone from the Area has
looked at a given spec, we should not want or need such reviews
for specs originating from any Apps Area WG (including AppsAWG).
By definition, there are Apps folks represented in such work; if
there were not, the WGs would presumably not exist or would be
in some other area.  And, while there are specific exceptions,
an early/ preliminary review of WG work within the area could be
interpreted as saying something profound about what we think
about, and how much we trust, our own WGs.

   john

---

From: SM <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 02:57:59 -0700

>for specs originating from any Apps Area WG (including AppsAWG).

If I am not mistaken all reviews for Apps Area WG were done around 
the time of a Last Call.  It was more as another pair of eyes.

>about, and how much we trust, our own WGs.

I'll list some definitions so that we are all on the same wavelength:

  (a) preliminary review - done before a WGLC

  (b) early review - post-WGLC

  (c) review - Last Call has been issued

There were only two cases when item (a) occurred for drafts in the 
Apps Area.  I'll consider them as exceptions.  The condition for (a) 
is Apps AD or WG Chair approval.  If there is any objection to (a) as 
a review option, I'll drop it.

I'll lump (b) and (c) together as it is convenient for me.  Here are 
some reviews of drafts within the Apps Area (excluding individual submissions):

http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg05787.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg05775.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg05115.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg04598.html

And of drafts which are from the Security Area but also fit under Apps:

http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg05306.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg05100.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg04811.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/apps-discuss/current/msg04799.html

I cannot comment on the reviews.  I leave it to you to determine 
whether there were positive results and whether it was worth the 
additional mail traffic.

Barry suggested some alternatives at 
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/appsdir/current/msg00951.html

Assuming that we are doing (b) and (c):-

Arrangement 4a:
AppsDir reviews go to authors with CC to ietf@ with BCC to apps-discuss.

Arangement 4b:
AppsDir reviews go to authors with CC to ietf@ with BCC to appsdir.

I used BCC as some people will blindly hit on "reply to all".

(5a) Non-apps issues are discussed on the WG mailing list.  There is 
a Cc to the Team Lead.

(5b) Minor issues are discussed on the WG mailing list.  There is a 
Cc to the Team Lead.

(5c) Nits are discussed on the WG mailing list, the document shepherd 
advises on the venue.  There is a Cc to the Team Lead.

(5d) I'll put the "issues have been addressed" on the WG mailing list 
with a Cc to the Team Lead.  I may be the only one who uses that 
review format. :-)

Arrangement 5 can be implemented now.  I haven't looked into how much 
traffic it would take off apps-discuss.

Best regards,
-sm

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 07:11:07 -0400

> It isn't to get some sort of Area consensus on the document: if

My point was that, if we actually think that we need such perspectives
for so many documents, then that's something the area ought to see.  I
wasn't imagining it meant consensus.  Just that, if something is
supposed to be "coming from" the applications area, however
informally, the area ought to see it.

> sure someone from the area takes a careful look" basis

I don't believe for a second that officially-sanctioned area reviews
that are advertised as such are in fact regarded as "just another
review" by editors or WG chairs, and I don't think they're treated
that way by ADs, either.  If that's what those app area reviews are,
then I think the note that they are app area reviews should itself be
removed.  

Best,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 12:00:04 -0400

--On Monday, May 21, 2012 07:11 -0400 Andrew Sullivan
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>...
>> > I'll note that Andrew has specifically opined that the
>> > AppsDir reviews DO belong with the general apps
>> > discussion... why are we bothering to do apps reviews, he
>> > asks, if the reviews aren't of interest to the apps area?
>> 
> My point was that, if we actually think that we need such
> perspectives for so many documents, then that's something the
> area ought to see.  I wasn't imagining it meant consensus.
> Just that, if something is supposed to be "coming from" the
> applications area, however informally, the area ought to see
> it.

I think I would draw a boundary between interpreting "ought to
see" as "put it on the mailing list and hope that it makes
everyone read it" and "make it available" for those who are
interested.  The logic behind the first could logically be
extended to argue that all such reviews should be copied to all
Apps Area WG mailing lists as well because there is no more
obligation to subscribe to AppsDir or Apps-Discuss than there is
to subscribe to ietf-discuss.   One might then make an
observation about leading horses to water, but that would
presumably be unnecessary and trite.

If your suggestion was that we archive all such reports on a
readily-accessible web page and either create a separate
"announce" list for that web page or that a monthly report
(identifying information and links only) be sent to
Apps-Discuss, I'd have no problem with it.  But interpreting
"the area ought to see it" as "those reports are so important
that we should flood everyone who subscribed to a list for a
different purpose in the hope that they will find it interesting
or useful (or because it is good for them)"... no, unless one is
determined to reduce effective participation in the area.

> I don't believe for a second that officially-sanctioned area
> reviews that are advertised as such are in fact regarded as
> "just another review" by editors or WG chairs, and I don't
> think they're treated that way by ADs, either.  If that's what
> those app area reviews are, then I think the note that they
> are app area reviews should itself be removed.  

Well, I think you are right about the expectation of special
treatment despite the disclaimers.  But, especially if you are,
we are pretending really hard.  Perhaps more important, it warps
our processes that contain the expectation that any opinions
that are given special weight come from:

	-- consensus within some identifiable and relevant
	group, or
	
	-- an acknowledged expert with special knowledge or
	history about the specification.

These reviews do not inherently meet either of those criteria.
The idea that a reviewer who is semi-random with regard to a
particular spec can get special authority by the luck of the
draw is quite problematic, at least IMO.

best,
   john

---

From: Tony Hansen <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 17:17:02 -0400

You left off
     Arrangement 0: no change
and
     Arrangement 1c: AppsAWG and apps gen stay on apps-discuss. Reviews 
to authors + apps-review.

I have a preference for 0 followed by 1c, 1b and 1a.

     Tony

---

From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 17:56:41 -0400

Hi all,

I'm sure not going to die on this hill, so this will be my last
remark.  

> extended to argue that all such reviews should be copied to all

Yes, and if we bought every slippery-slope argument, then we'd put
everything on the IETF mailing list.  But slippery-slope arguments are
at least problematic.  The point I was trying to make is that
something that purports to be a statement on behalf of those with apps
clue might we waved in front of the apps community to see whether it
entices reactions to bad smells.  If it's not supposed to be "from
someone with apps clue" then eliminate the advertising clause.  If the
advert is to remain, then the community oughta take an interest.

> we are pretending really hard.

Of course we're pretending really hard.  The IETF just changed a
3-phase standards track to a 2-phase standards track in order to
eliminate the 3d phase that nobody gets to because they don't get to
the 2d phase.  Humpty Dumpty'd be proud.  But if reviews are going to
come with an advertisement on the top about who sent them, then the
processes are irrelevant: they get special treatment.  If we don't
want that, we should get rid of the adverts.

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 May 2012 23:28:11 -0400

> I'm sure not going to die on this hill, so this will be my last

And I unsubscribed from AppsDir earlier today.  If I don't have
time to follow the list properly without the traffic interfering
with things I have much more need to follow, that seems a better
remedy.  Apps-Discuss is probably next -- I really need to focus
on what I can do well given available time.

> Yes, and if we bought every slippery-slope argument, then we'd
> put everything on the IETF mailing list.

We already post all IETF Last Call reviews to the IETF list
(read the announcement boilerplate) so, if this is a slippery
slope argument, we may be sliding uphill.

>  But slippery-slope
> arguments are at least problematic.  The point I was trying to
> make is that something that purports to be a statement on
> behalf of those with apps clue might we waved in front of the
> apps community to see whether it entices reactions to bad
> smells.  If it's not supposed to be "from someone with apps
> clue" then eliminate the advertising clause.  If the advert is
> to remain, then the community oughta take an interest.

You certainly aren't going to get me to argue that the advert
and the "individual review" disclaimer are rationally consistent
with each other.

But, while you may accuse this of being a different slippery
slope argument, if a review is to be considered "from the area"
then it should be posted to some relevant area list only,
comments collected, and then a revised/consensus version posted
to the IETF list.  

>> treatment despite the disclaimers.  But, especially if you
>> are, we are pretending really hard.
> 
> Of course we're pretending really hard.  The IETF just changed
> a 3-phase standards track to a 2-phase standards track in
> order to eliminate the 3d phase that nobody gets to because
> they don't get to the 2d phase.  Humpty Dumpty'd be proud.
> But if reviews are going to come with an advertisement on the
> top about who sent them, then the processes are irrelevant:
> they get special treatment.  If we don't want that, we should
> get rid of the adverts.

Or actually give an opportunity for a consolidated, ideally
consensus, view to be expressed.

   john