On 1/7/19 10:06 PM, Russ Allbery wrote:
Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> writes:On the other hand, the IETF seems to do just fine - with a much larger base of participants, and a lot more room for discussion and debate on contentious issues. Global infrastructure, with distributed ownership, lots of stakeholders, all held together by agreements, with the decision processes open to pretty much anybody who shows up. The process puts pretty much everyone else to shame - with lots to be learned from it.Speaking as someone who is a listed author on three published RFCs and chaired one IETF working group, I will take Debian process over IETF process any day, and find your description of the IETF pretty entertaining. :)
Well yeah, but which "works" better in terms of results? Particularly, as viewed by those who are impacted by the process?
In the case of IETF, it sure seems like the needs of users, network operators, and equipment makers are well represented. As compared to Debian, where I see little regard for either users, or upstream developers.
The WG & IETF lists tend to have less bull twaddle - though the ICANN transition was an interesting period, and a far more open process, if somewhat a foregone conclusion.
Also, please note that many IETF participants are paid as part of their job to participate in the IETF. (We keep coming back to that.) That's true of some Debian contributors as well, of course, but I strongly suspect the percentage is lower.
Now that's definitely true. Back in my BBN days, I was only peripherally involved (I tended to work on projects that contributed to standards work, but generally didn't go to the meetings) - I definitely envied some of the travel opportunities afforded to the folks who went to the meetings, on the company dime. Me, I got to go to DoD meetings (though some of those were also in "interesting" places).
Miles -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra