Re: [10GMMF] Agenda (draft) for March LRM
Steve,
Your questions and concerns are good ones. I'm sure there are many other people in the TF that need these questions answered too.
RE:
I remain puzzled by your explanation of "no open technical issues."
ANS:
At the threshold of WG Ballot the normal IEEE 802.3 definition of no open technical issues is that there are no new functions or completely test procedures to be added to the specification to make it complete.
As far as I can tell there are no new functions or tests mentioned in any of the comments. All the comments are directed towards improving, technically or editorially the functions, tests and specifications already in the standard.
RE:
I firmly believe that there are several open technical issues on this draft.
ANS:
By open technical issues I assume you mean that you think that some of the specification values or test procedures within draft D1.1 may not be correct or will need to changed. For example you may believe we cannot support the operating range on some fiber types or you may believe that the parameters for some of the conformance tests are not correct etc., To start Working Group Ballot these specifications do not have to be absolutely correct. However, the TF must have decided, by concensus, reasonable initial values for each parameter. It is expected that the TF will continue to work on the specifications and that the draft will be reviewed and improved during the Ballot process.
RE:
"Given the unanimous vote to forward D1.1 to IEEE 802.3 for preview
I must manage the meeting to maximize the likelihood of achieving
Working Group Ballot." - it appears that we have already made a decision
to go to WG ballot.
ANS:
LRM voted to send draft D1.1 to IEEE 802.3 for preview in ANTICIPATION of asking IEEE 802.3 permission to go to Working Group Ballot. In the closing LRM plenary session at the March meeting LRM must take a technical vote to direct me to ask IEEE 802.3 permission to go to working group ballot. The decision is not made until that vote is taken. So the group still has to decide whether it wants to go to Working Group Ballot out of the March meeting.
However, as chair, I believe I have stated my responsibility to the group correctly. When the group decided to send D1.1 to IEEE 802.3 for pre-review this signalled to me that the group strongly desires to go to WG Ballot out of the March Meeting. In addition, I checked at the January meeting that our timeline was still supported by the group, it was. The LRM timeline states that we plan to go to WG ballot in March05.
I believe the consensus of the LRM group is as follows:
1) D1.1 is complete, no TBD's.
2) All specification values have reasonable initial values in terms of starting to ballot the draft.
3) There are no open technical issues in terms of requiring new features or tests.
My job as chair is to ensure that in the refining of D1.1 into D1.2 we do nothing to reduce consensus or break the draft in terms of completeness and lack of open technical issues (of the type I have described). As I have said the group needs to take seriously the issue of only making changes that undeniably IMPROVE D1.2 compared to D1.1.
RE: If it was a matter of waiting until the March meeting for the vote, was there any need to generate a whole bunch of comments to reject?
ANS:
The comments are marked "Rejected by the Editor". At the beginning of our comment review the LRM group will have to take a vote to accept these as rejected comments. If the LRM group does not accept them as rejected comments then we will have rearrange the agenda to attempt to resolve them at this meeting.
I directed the editor to mark these comments as "Rejected by the Editor" in the belief that, given our time constraints, it is not efficient to attempt to resolve these incomplete comments. I also assumed that the consensus of LRM was that draft D1.1 is complete with no open technical issues per my previous definitions.
However, all feedback on the draft is valuable and should be welcomed. It should not be ignored. These comments point to particular issues with the specification that obviously concern some people and will likely need to be addressed in WG Ballot. This is why, although I have assumed the group will accept these comments as rejected comments, I have include a session on the agenda to review the comments and to understand how we can work to resolve any issues the commenter may have between March and May.
RE:
Why didn't we just go to WG ballot out of the January meeting? It
doesn't appear that we have made any significant changes to the previous
draft. There were no TBDs in D1.1 nor did we add any new functions that
I am aware of.
ANS:
A TF must request WG Ballot at a Plenary meeting. Therefore the best the TF could do is what we have in fact done. We have made IEEE 802.3 aware that we are ready for WG Ballot and sent them a complete pre-view draft. We are allowed to attempt to improve the preview draft but must show improvements to IEEE 802.3 before we ask for WG Ballot.
We can also get ready for WG Ballot for example by understanding the next level of issues that need to be address. The "Rejected by the Editor" comments are a very good place to start planning for WG Ballot.
This all very normal process within IEEE 802.3.
RE:
It seems like all comments attempting to address the
"open technical issues" have been rejected.
ANS:
As I have explained there are no open technical issues with D1.1. in a form that by past precedent should impede LRM going to WG Ballot. Also, in my opinion none have been raised in the review of D1.1.
The comments marked "Rejected by the Editor" suggest concern that some of the initial specifications are incorrect. However, these comments made no specific requests for new features, functions or tests. Rather they tended to request studies, improvements, extrapolations, guess's.... be made to resolve suggested concerns in various specifications, functions and tests already within the draft.
Furthermore, I would suggest that many of the requests for study to improve particular specification values can not be completed at the Plenary meeting. These comments are unlikely to improve D1.1 next week. By understanding the issues we may be able to do the studies and improve D1.2 for the May interim. These comments are not being ignored. They are being used to develop a plan to address issues that may be important at WG Ballot.
Unless of course the group decides to attempt to resolve them at the meeting - which is its right.
RE:
Is the need to go to WG ballot a timeline issue? Does it make sense to put in any comments prior to WG ballot?
ANS:
IEEE 802.3 has a tradition of driving its project to timelines. This is generally a good thing as it ensures the work gets done in a reasonable time and does not extend indefinitely. Obviously there are market and customers timing needs too. We must take those seriously. This is not an academic project or process.
As chair I am the project manager. But my master is really the consensus of the group. The group consensus is that the timeline matters and that it wants to go to WG Ballot in March. I have an obligation to the group to drive a process that is most likely to result in the outcome it has by consensus requested. Until the group provides me with different marching orders I have no choice but to drive towards WG Ballot. I have no problem with this as I agree with the group, in my opinion D1.2 will be more than ready for WG Ballot.
And yes, it does make sense to give a project feedback and comments before Working Group Ballot. How else would a group develop its complete draft for it first WG Ballot? I would also hope that the TF members realize they have an obligation to produce a complete draft and to improve it by providing feedback on the preceding drafts.
RE:
I am sorry to hassle you about process but for some reason, something
just doesn't feel right to me.
ANS:
I don't understand? This is perfectly normal process for IEEE 802.3. Please give me examples of projects where it was done was differently? Every project I have been part of has done it this way???
Regards,
David
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-stds-802-3-10gmmf@IEEE.ORG
[mailto:owner-stds-802-3-10gmmf@IEEE.ORG]On Behalf Of Swanson, Steven E
Sent: 11 March 2005 16:13
To: STDS-802-3-10GMMF@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: Re: [10GMMF] Agenda (draft) for March LRM
David,
Thanks for the clarification on the requirements that we must meet
before going to WG ballot - I was planning to ask this question at the
meeting so that I could make an informed vote on whether to go to WG
ballot. However, I remain puzzled by your explanation of "no open
technical issues." I firmly believe that there are several open
technical issues on this draft. To me, it almost seems like the ballot
conducted after the January meeting was not needed because you state
that "Given the unanimous vote to forward D1.1 to IEEE 802.3 for preview
I must manage the meeting to maximize the likelihood of achieving
Working Group Ballot." - it appears that we have already made a decision
to go to WG ballot. If it was a matter of waiting until the March
meeting for the vote, was there any need to generate a whole bunch of
comments to reject? I am not trying to be an obstructionist here but I
would like to better understand the process.
Why didn't we just go to WG ballot out of the January meeting? It
doesn't appear that we have made any significant changes to the previous
draft. There were no TBDs in D1.1 nor did we add any new functions that
I am aware of. It seems like all comments attempting to address the
"open technical issues" have been rejected. Maybe I am overreacting here
since the same comments will come in against the WG ballot but again, I
am confused by the process. Is the need to go to WG ballot a timeline
issue? Does it make sense to put in any comments prior to WG ballot?
I am sorry to hassle you about process but for some reason, something
just doesn't feel right to me.
Best regards,
Steve
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-stds-802-3-10gmmf@IEEE.ORG
[mailto:owner-stds-802-3-10gmmf@IEEE.ORG] On Behalf Of David Cunningham
Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2005 9:01 PM
To: STDS-802-3-10GMMF@LISTSERV.IEEE.ORG
Subject: [10GMMF] Agenda (draft) for March LRM
Dear IEEE 802.3aq,
Attached is the draft agenda for our D1.1 review meeting.
Given the project timeline the primary goal of next weeks meeting is to
gain permission from IEEE 802.3 to go to Working Group ballot.
According to the IEEE802.3 operating rules the requirements we must meet
are the following:
"2.8.2 Draft Standard Balloting Requirements
Before a draft is submitted to WG letter ballot it shall in addition
have met the following requirements:
a) It must be complete with no open technical issues.
b) It must be made available for pre-view by the membership by the
Monday prior to the plenary week. If any changes are made to the draft
after the draft was made available for pre-view the textual changes
shall be presented for review during the closing plenary immediately
prior to the vote for approval to go to WG ballot.
c) It must be formatted according to the IEEE style selected by the WG
Chair. This style will be selected to minimize the editorial work
required for publication of the draft.
d) It must be approved for submittal to WG ballot at the 802.3 WG
closing plenary."
Given the unanimous vote to forward D1.1 to IEEE 802.3 for preview I
must manage the meeting to maximize the likelihood of achieving Working
Group Ballot. Therefore, I have arranged the agenda so that we complete
comment review on the non-rejected technical comments and as many
editorial comments as possible on the first day of the IEEE 802.3aq
meeting. This will provide our editor with the maximum amount of time to
make the edits to the document for the Thursday review of it by IEEE
802.3.
I have reviewed the comments and submitted presentations to confirm that
we do not need to hear the submitted presentations to be able to resolve
the non-rejected comments. We do however need to hear them before we
discuss the rejected comments. Therefore, most of Wednesday is devoted
to presentations and to reviewing the rejected comments. The
presentations have a lot in common with the issues raised in the
rejected comments and so I suggest we go through them first. The
rejected comments will likely re-emerge in our first Working Group
Ballot. We must review them, understand them, and agree plans to
resolve them for the May interim meeting.
To achieve permission for Working Group Ballot in March we must be very
disciplined and make only precise changes to the draft. For IEEE 802.3
to allow us to go to WG ballot rough rules-of-thumb would be as follows:
1) D1.2 should have many pages of the draft per D1.1.
2) Pages with edits should have only a few lines or table entries
changed.
3) We should give priority to feedback from the IEEE 802.3 pre-viewers
not in our group; after all they are our masters.
4) We should do nothing that might reduce the consensus on D1.1 within
LRM.
5) Complex changes should be kept for WG Ballot.
To go to Working Group ballot we need a complete draft not an absolutely
perfect or correct draft. The draft is complete, some specifications
and tests need fine-tuning, some more simulations need to be done. This
is normal for this stage of the process.
Regarding the IEEE 802.3 requirement of "no open technical issues": if
we have no TBD's, no new functions to add, and our comments are aimed at
improving specifications or tests already within the draft, then we have
no open technical issues. As far as I can see all the comments we
received, even the rejected ones, could not be portrayed as open
technical issues.
I will end the meeting at 10:30 AM on Thursday. This is to allow Nick
and myself some preparation time to finalize the report we have to give
to IEEE 802.3 on Thursday afternoon.
See you in Atlanta,
David