Proto E. Juskevicius Internet Draft TrekAhead Intended status: Informational May 2, 2010 Expires: November 2, 2010 Definition of Working Group Document States draft-ietf-proto-wgdocument-states-03.txt Status of this Memo This Internet-Draft is submitted to IETF in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet- Drafts. Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress." The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html This Internet-Draft will expire on November 2, 2010. Copyright Notice Copyright (c) 2010 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 1] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 Abstract This document defines different states that an Internet-Draft (I-D) may be in while associated with an IETF working group. The first state describes an I-D that is being considered for adoption by a working group. One of several possible last states describes an I-D that has been sent to the IESG for publication. The IETF Datatracker tool will be enhanced to make it possible for working group chairs to indicate the status of working group documents in order to provide more feedback and transparency to document authors and to the IETF community. Appendix A describes different states used by IETF Area Directors to indicate the status of I-Ds sent to the IESG for review and publication. Table of Contents 1. Introduction...................................................4 2. Conventions used in this document..............................4 3. Document States................................................4 3.1. Document Validity States..................................4 3.1.1. I-D Exists...........................................5 3.1.2. Expired..............................................5 3.1.3. Active...............................................5 3.2. IESG Document States......................................5 3.2.1. Publication Requested................................6 3.2.2. AD Evaluation........................................6 3.2.3. IESG Evaluation......................................6 3.2.4. Other IESG Document States...........................6 3.3. Working Group Document States.............................7 3.3.1. Candidate WG Document................................7 3.3.2. Active WG Document...................................7 3.3.3. Adopted For WG Info Only.............................8 3.3.4. Not Adopted by a WG..................................8 3.3.5. Parked WG Draft......................................8 3.3.6. Dead WG Draft........................................9 3.3.7. In WG Last Call......................................9 3.3.8. Waiting for WG Chair Go-Ahead........................9 3.3.9. WG Consensus: Waiting for Write-Up...................9 3.3.10. Submitted to IESG for Publication..................10 3.4. Working Group Document State Diagram.....................10 3.5. WG Document Status Annotation Tags.......................12 3.5.1. Awaiting Cross-Area Review..........................12 3.5.2. Awaiting MIB Doctor Review..........................12 3.5.3. Awaiting Security Review............................12 Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 2] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 3.5.4. Awaiting Other Review...............................13 3.5.5. Awaiting Merge with Other Document..................13 3.5.6. Author or Editor Needed.............................13 3.5.7. Held due to Dependency *on* other Document..........13 3.5.8. Held due to Dependency *by* other Document..........14 3.5.9. Revised I-D Needed - Issue raised by WG Last Call...14 3.5.10. Revised I-D Needed - Issue raised by AD............14 3.5.11. Revised I-D Needed - Issue raised by IESG..........14 3.5.12. Doc Shepherd Follow-Up Underway....................15 3.5.13. Not Intended for Publication.......................15 3.5.14. Other - see Comment Log............................15 3.6. Intended Maturity Level of WG Documents..................15 4. Security Considerations.......................................16 5. IANA Considerations...........................................16 6. References....................................................16 6.1. Normative References.....................................16 6.2. Informative References...................................16 7. Acknowledgments...............................................17 Appendix A: "IESG Document" States...............................18 A.1. Definition of "IESG Document" States.....................18 A.1.1. I-D Exists..........................................18 A.1.2. Publication Requested...............................18 A.1.3. AD Evaluation.......................................18 A.1.4. Expert Review.......................................18 A.1.5. Last Call Requested.................................19 A.1.6. In Last Call........................................19 A.1.7. Waiting for Write-up................................19 A.1.8. Waiting for AD Go-Ahead.............................19 A.1.9. IESG Evaluation.....................................19 A.1.10. IESG Evaluation - Defer............................19 A.1.11. Approved - Announcement to be sent.................20 A.1.12. Approved - Announcement sent.......................20 A.1.13. RFC Ed Queue.......................................20 A.1.14. RFC Published......................................20 A.1.15. DNP - Waiting for AD note..........................20 A.1.16. DNP - Announcement to be sent......................20 A.1.17. AD is Watching.....................................20 A.1.18. Dead...............................................21 A.2. IESG Document Substates..................................21 A.2.1. Point Raised - Write-up needed......................21 A.2.2. AD Follow-up........................................21 A.2.3. External Party......................................22 A.2.4. Revised I-D Needed..................................22 Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 3] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 1. Introduction The IETF Datatracker is a web-based system for managing information about Internet-Drafts (I-Ds), RFCs and several other important aspects of the IETF process [IDTRACKER]. The Datatracker can provide a lot of information about the status and progression of Internet-Drafts that have been sent to the IESG for review and publication. In contrast, the Datatracker has almost no information about the status of IETF working group documents. The Datatracker can only report on the validity of I-Ds until they are sent to the IESG (e.g. "I-D Exists", "Expired", "Active"). This document defines new states to be added to the Datatracker to make it possible for working group chairs to indicate the status and progression of Internet-Drafts in their working groups. 2. Conventions used in this document The phrase "working group document" is to be interpreted as being synonymous with "working group I-D" and "working group draft". The same is true for the plural case of each phrase. The phrase "working group document" is not intended to apply to any other document that may be reviewed, discussed, or produced by an IETF working group. Working group meeting materials such as Blue Sheets, agendas, jabber logs, scribe's notes, minutes, and presentation slides are not to be considered as "working group documents" in the context of this document. 3. Document States This section summarizes existing document states in the Datatracker and it describes several new states that need to be added in order to provide status information about IETF working group drafts. 3.1. Document Validity States The Datatracker can be queried for validity status information about every I-D. There are three validity states: - I-D Exists - Expired - Active Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 4] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 3.1.1. I-D Exists When an I-D is submitted to the IETF, the submission is logged in a database that can be searched by the Datatracker. "I-D Exists" is a default state manufactured by the Datatracker to describe every I-D that exists in the database for which no other status information can be found. A document described as "I-D Exists" may or may not be a working group document. "I-D Exists" may apply to an I-D in any of the document streams (e.g. IETF, IAB, IRTF, Independent Submission) defined in RFC 4844 [RFC4844] and RFC 5742 [RFC5742]. 3.1.2. Expired An "Expired" I-D is a document that is more than six months old and that has not been updated or replaced by a newer version. Every Internet-Draft has a normal lifespan of 185 days. An I-D will expire and be deleted from the I-D repository after six months unless it is updated or replaced by a newer version. One exception is that an I-D under official review by the IESG will not be expired before its status is resolved (e.g. the I-D is published as an RFC). IESG states that do not relate to a formal request to publish a document (e.g. "AD is Watching") do not prevent an I-D from expiring [AUTHGUIDE]. 3.1.3. Active An "Active" I-D is a document that is not expired and for which the Datatracker has some additional status information. An "Active" document may be an Individual Draft or an I-D that the Datatracker believes to be associated with an IETF working group (e.g. because the filename includes the name of a WG). "Active" may also used to describe an I-D under formal review by the IESG or an I-D that is in the RFC Editor Queue, etc. "Active" is not a reliable indicator of whether an I-D is being actively developed in an IETF working group [WGDTSPEC]. 3.2. IESG Document States There are more than a dozen states in the IESG state machine. They are used to indicate the status and progression of I-Ds under review by the IESG [IDSTATES]. The following sections describe three Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 5] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 states which should be of interest to document authors and working group chairs. 3.2.1. Publication Requested "Publication Requested" describes an I-D for which a formal request has been sent to the IESG to advance/publish the Internet- Draft as an RFC, following the procedures described in Section 7.5 of RFC 2418 [RFC2418]. Most working group documents sent to the IESG enter the IESG state machine at this point. An I-D in the "Publication Requested" state has not (yet) been reviewed by an Area Director and no official action has been taken on the I-D other than to note that its publication has been requested. 3.2.2. AD Evaluation "AD Evaluation" is used to describe an I-D that the responsible Area Director has begun to review. The purpose of the review is to verify the I-D is ready for advancement before an IETF Last Call is started or before the document is progressed to the IESG as a whole. After completing her/his evaluation, the Area Director may decide the I-D needs to be revised before it can progress further. The AD may send the I-D back to working group that created it for revision. 3.2.3. IESG Evaluation "IESG Evaluation" is another state that may cause an I-D to be sent back to an IETF working group for revision. "IESG Evaluation" describes a document that is being formally reviewed by the entire IESG. Every Area Director is expected to review the document and to air any issues he/she may have. Issues that cannot be resolved are documented as "discuss" comments that can be forwarded to the document author and/or the WG chair. A "discuss" with serious issues may cause the I-D to be returned to the working group for revision. 3.2.4. Other IESG Document States See Appendix A and [IDSTATES]. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 6] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 3.3. Working Group Document States This section describes new states to be added to the Datatracker to make it possible for working group chairs and/or their delegates to indicate the status of working group drafts. Each working group chair will have the option to use some, all or none of the working group document states to describe the status of some, all or none of the I-Ds associated with his/her working group. WG document states may be augmented by the use of one or more of the annotation tags in Section 3.5. Annotation tags provide more information about the status of an I-D and/or about an action that may be needed to progress the document. 3.3.1. Candidate WG Document The "Candidate WG Document" state may be used to describe an I-D that is being considered for adoption by an IETF working group. An I-D in this state has not (yet) achieved consensus, preference or selection in a working group. This state may be used to describe: - an I-D that someone has asked to be considered by a working group, if the chair has agreed with the request; - an I-D that the WG chair asked an author to write; or - an I-D listed as a 'candidate draft' in the WG charter. An I-D may be a "Candidate WG Document" for more than one working group at a time. This is to identify and track a document that its author is 'shopping' to multiple working groups hoping to get the draft adopted somewhere. 3.3.2. Active WG Document An "Active WG Document" is an I-D that has been adopted by an IETF working group and is being actively developed. Note the "Active WG Document" state is not the same as the "Active" validity state described in Section 3.1.3. There are several differences. One is that a WG chair will be able to enter additional information about an "Active WG Document" into the Datatracker. For example, a WG chair will be able to indicate the intended maturity level of the document (e.g. Informational, Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 7] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 Proposed Standard). This information is often requested by the community and it is now required by the IESG for all documents sent to them for publication. Under normal conditions, it should not be possible for an I-D to be active in more than one working group at a time. That being said, documents may be transferred from one working group to another. The Datatracker will make it possible to track when an "Active WG Document" is transferred from one IETF working group to another. 3.3.3. Adopted For WG Info Only The "Adopted For WG Info Only" state describes a document that contains useful information for the working group, however the document will not be published as an RFC. The only purpose of the draft is to provide information for internal use by the working group. 3.3.4. Not Adopted by a WG Some of the I-Ds written for consideration by IETF working groups do not get adopted. The "Not Adopted by a WG" state describes an I-D that had been considered for adoption by one or more working groups and was not adopted by any working group. A candidate draft may be moved into "Not Adopted by a WG" at any time by a WG chair or automatically by the Datatracker (eg. after expiry of a 'must be adopted by a specified date or else' timer). An I-D that was a candidate in two or more working groups should only be moved into this state after it is clear that no working group will adopt it. In this scenario, the Datatracker may be programmed to send an e-mail nudge to each working group chair to warn that the I-D will be moved into the "Not Adopted by a WG" state unless the document in placed into a different state soon (e.g. Active WG Document, Adopted for WG Info Only). 3.3.5. Parked WG Draft A "Parked WG Draft" is an I-D that has lost its author or editor, is waiting for another document to be written or for a review to be completed, or cannot be progressed by the working group for some other reason. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 8] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 This state may be used in conjunction with the annotation tags described in Section 3.5 to indicate why the I-D was parked, and/or what may need to happen for the I-D to be un-parked. 3.3.6. Dead WG Draft A "Dead WG Draft" is an I-D that has been abandoned. Note that dead is not always a final state for a working group draft. If consensus is subsequently achieved, a "Dead WG Draft" may be resurrected. 3.3.7. In WG Last Call A document "In WG Last Call" is an I-D for which a Working Group Last Call (WGLC) has been issued, and is in progress. A document in this state should remain "In WG Last Call" until the WG chair moves it to another state. The Datatracker may be programmed (at the start of a WGLC) to send an e-mail to the chair after a specified period of time to remind or 'nudge' the chair to conclude the WGLC and to determine the next state for the document. Note that working group last calls are an optional part of the IETF working group process, per section 7.4 of RFC 2418 [RFC2418]. 3.3.8. Waiting for WG Chair Go-Ahead An I-D which receives a lot of comments during a working group last call may be placed into the "Waiting for WG Chair Go-Ahead" state to indicate the last call has ended, however the chair is not yet ready to call consensus on the document. If comments from the WGLC need to be responded to, or a revision to the I-D is needed, then the chair may wish to put the I-D into this state until he/she can verify all of the WGLC comments are adequately addressed and the (possibly revised) document is in the I-D directory. 3.3.9. WG Consensus: Waiting for Write-Up A document in the "WG Consensus: Waiting for Write-Up" state has essentially completed its development within the working group, and is nearly ready to be sent to the IESG for publication. The last thing to be done is the preparation of a write-up by a document shepherd. The IESG requires that a document shepherd write-up be completed before publication of the I-D is requested. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 9] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 A WG chair may call consensus on a draft without a formal working group last call. An "Active WG Document" may be progressed into this state if the chair has rough consensus on the document. Alternatively, an I-D may traverse the "In WG Last Call" and/or the "Waiting for WG Chair Go-Ahead" state before consensus on it is called. This state includes 'waiting for write-up' because document shepherds need time to prepare good write-ups. 3.3.10. Submitted to IESG for Publication This state describes a WG document that has been submitted to the IESG for publication and that has not been sent back to the working group for revision. A document in this state may be under review by the IESG, or it may have been approved and be in the RFC Editor's queue, or it may have been published as an RFC. Other possibilities exist too (e.g. the document may be "Dead" or in a "Do Not Publish" state). 3.4. Working Group Document State Diagram Figure 1 illustrates all of the WG documents states and many of the state transitions that an I-D may experience during its tenure as a WG document. The WG document states are capitalized for clarity. Not every possible state transition is illustrated in the diagram. The absence of an explicit path between two states does not mean the state transition is precluded. A working group document may be moved from any state to any other state by the WG chair or his/her delegate. If an unusual or uncommon state change is made, some text to explain the transition may be entered in a comment log in the Datatracker. Note that the state diagram includes an arc from "IESG States" to "ACTIVE WG DOCUMENT". This illustrates that the IESG may send an I-D back to working group for revision. Section 3.2 describes the relevant IESG states. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 10] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 +------------------------------------------------------------------+ | I-D Exists | | | | | v | | | | ADOPTED FOR <----- CANDIDATE WG -----> NOT ADOPTED | | WG INFO ONLY DOCUMENT BY A WG | | | | | | | | v | | | | PARKED WG <----------> ACTIVE WG <--------> DEAD WG | | DRAFT . - -> DOCUMENT DRAFT | | . | | . / \ | | . / \ | | . / \ | | . v \ | | . \ | | . IN WG --+ v | | LAST CALL | | | ^ | +-> WG CONSENSUS: | | ' | WAITING FOR | | ' v +--> WRITE-UP | | ^ | | | | ' WAITING FOR | | | | ' WG CHAIR --+ | | | ^ GO-AHEAD v | | . | | SUBMITTED | | (revision needed) TO IESG | | . FOR PUBLICATION | | . | | | . v | | . | | - - - < - - IESG States [IDSTATES] | | | | | v | +------------------------------------------------------------------+ Figure 1 - Diagram of I-D states relevant to IETF working groups Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 11] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 3.5. WG Document Status Annotation Tags In addition to indicating the state of working group documents, the Datatracker will allow different substate conditions to be described and tracked. This section defines several annotation tags that may be used to clarify why a document is in the state it is in, and/or to indicate the next action needed to progress the document. Annotation tags do not change the state of WG documents. Each of the annotation tags defined herein may be used to provide more information about the status of any WG document in any state, if it makes sense to do so. Each annotation tag may be used by itself, or in combination with other tags, to clarify the status of a working group document. 3.5.1. Awaiting Cross-Area Review This tag may be most often associated with an "Active" or "Parked" WG document. The tag means that someone (e.g. an author or editor of the document, or a WG chair) has initiated a cross-area review of the document, and the review has not (yet) been completed. Documents tagged with this annotation should retain the tag until the review is complete and possibly until any issues raised in the review are addressed. 3.5.2. Awaiting MIB Doctor Review This tag may be most often associated with an "Active" or "Parked" WG document. The tag means that means that someone (e.g. an author or editor of the document, or the WG chair) has initiated a review of the document by a MIB Doctor, and the review has not (yet) been completed. Documents tagged with this annotation should retain the tag until the review is complete and possibly until any issues raised in the review are addressed. 3.5.3. Awaiting Security Review This tag may be most often associated with an "Active" or "Parked" WG document. The tag means that means that someone (e.g. an author or editor of the document, or a WG chair) has initiated a review of security considerations in the document, and the review has not (yet) been completed. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 12] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 Documents tagged with this annotation should retain the tag until the review is complete and possibly until the issues raised in the review are addressed. 3.5.4. Awaiting Other Review This tag may be most often associated with an "Active" or "Parked" WG document. The tag means that someone (e.g. an author or editor of the document, or a WG chair) has initiated some other review of the document (e.g. sent it to another Standards Development Organization (SDO) for comments via a formal or informal liaison process [MPLSTPDP]) and the review has not (yet) been completed. Documents tagged with this annotation should retain the tag until the review is complete and possibly until any issues raised in the review are addressed. 3.5.5. Awaiting Merge with Other Document This tag means that a decision has been made by someone (e.g. the document author, editor, or the WG chair) to merge the I-D with one or more other I-Ds from the same (or other) working group. If the result of the merge is a new I-D having a different title, then the old I-D may be declared as being a "Dead WG Draft". In such a case the annotation tag should be changed from "Awaiting Merge with Other Document" to "Other - see Comment Log" and a description of the merge should be entered in the log for posterity. If the result of the merge operation is a revision to the old I-D, then this tag should be cleared when the revised (merged) I-D is submitted to the working group. 3.5.6. Author or Editor Needed This tag means an I-D has lost a primary author or editor, and that further work on the I-D cannot continue in an effective or efficient manner until a new author or editor is found. 3.5.7. Held due to Dependency *on* other Document This tag will be most often associated with an "Active" or "Parked" WG draft. This tag means that completion of the I-D is on-hold because the draft has a dependency on one or more other documents. A typical Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 13] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 example is where an I-D depends on another IETF document that has not yet progressed to a point where it may be referenced; the dependency may be on one or more documents in other IETF working groups or on work-in-progress in other SDOs. This tag should be removed after the dependency is cleared. 3.5.8. Held due to Dependency *by* other Document This tag is the inverse of 3.5.7, and will also be most often associated with an "Active" or a "Parked" WG document. This tag means that the I-D has been "Parked" because one or more other documents are dependent on it, and the chair wants to submit all of documents to the IESG (for publication) simultaneously. This tag should be removed after the dependency is cleared. 3.5.9. Revised I-D Needed - Issue raised by WG Last Call This annotation means the I-D needs to be revised to address issues raised during a working group last call. This annotation may also be used to indicate when the I-D is in the process of being revised. This tag should be removed after a revised version of the I-D is submitted to the WG. 3.5.10. Revised I-D Needed - Issue raised by AD This annotation means the responsible AD raised one or more issues with the I-D during "AD Evaluation" and that the AD sent the document back to the working group for revision. This annotation may also be used to indicate when the I-D is in the process of being revised. This tag should be removed after the revised version of the I-D is submitted to the WG. 3.5.11. Revised I-D Needed - Issue raised by IESG This annotation means that one or more IESG members had issues with the I-D during "IESG Evaluation" and the document was sent back to the working group for revision. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 14] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 This annotation may also be used to indicate that the revision to the I-D is in process. This tag should be removed after the revised version of the I-D is submitted to the WG. 3.5.12. Doc Shepherd Follow-Up Underway This annotation tag may be used to indicate that the shepherd for the WG document has begun working on the write-up required to submit the document (to the IESG) for publication. It is possible that too many I-Ds may arrive in a shepherd's queue in too short a time, and the shepherd cannot create satisfactory write-ups for all of the documents simultaneously. The presence of this tag may be used to confirm that a write-up for the I-D has been started; the absence of this tag may be interpreted to mean the opposite. 3.5.13. Not Intended for Publication This annotation tag may be used to clarify that the document adopted by the working group will be used for internal informational purposes only, and that the working group will not actively develop its contents or progress it for publication as an RFC. 3.5.14. Other - see Comment Log This annotation tag is a catch-all to indicate that someone (e.g. an author or editor of the document, the WG chair, the document shepherd) has entered one or more comments about the current status of the I-D into the IETF Datatracker. 3.6. Intended Maturity Level of WG Documents In addition to the annotation tags defined in section 3.5, the intended maturity level of every WG document should also be tracked. Maturity levels are defined in sections 4 and 5 of RFC 2026 [RFC2026]. They are: * "Experimental" * "Informational" * "Best Current Practice" * "Proposed Standard" * "Draft Standard" Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 15] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 * "Standard" * "Historic" 4. Security Considerations This document does not propose any new internet mechanisms, and has no security implications for the internet. 5. IANA Considerations This document does not require any new number assignments from IANA, and does not define any new numbering spaces to be administered by IANA. RFC-Editor: Please remove this section before publication. 6. References 6.1. Normative References [RFC4844] Diagle, L., Ed., and Internet Architecture Board, "The RFC Series and RFC Editor", RFC 4844, July 2007. [RFC5742] Alvestrand, H., Housley, R., "IESG Procedures for Handling Independent and IRTF Stream Submissions", BCP 92, RFC 5742, December 2009. [RFC2418] Bradner, S., Ed., "IETF Working Group Guidelines and Procedures", BCP 25, RFC 2418, September 1998. [RFC2026] Bradner, S., "The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 3", BCP 9, RFC 2026, October 1996. 6.2. Informative References [IDTRACKER] "The IETF Datatracker tool", Web Application: https://datatracker.ietf.org/, May 1, 2010. [AUTHGUIDE] Housley, R., Ed., for the IESG, "Guidelines to Authors of Internet-Drafts", February 9, 2010, http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-guidelines.txt. [WGDTSPEC] Juskevicius, E., "Minutes of wgdtspec BOF", Proceedings of IETF 77, March 26, 2010, http://www.ietf.org/proceedings/10mar/minutes/wgdtspec Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 16] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 [IDSTATES] "Main I-D States", Web Application: https://datatracker.ietf.org/idtracker/help/state/, April 20, 2010. [MPLSTPDP] Farrel, A., et al, "IETF Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) Transport Profile (MPLS-tp) Document Process", work-in-progress draft-IETF-MPLS-tp-process-05.txt, Section 2.3, January 24, 2010. [PROTO] Levkowetz, H., and Mankin, A., "Requirements on I-D Tracker Extensions for Working Group Chairs", draft-ietf-proto-wgchair-tracker-ext-03, February 8, 2007. 7. Acknowledgments The author would like to thank Henrik Levkowetz and Allison Mankin for writing the original I-D [PROTO] that provided copious amounts of text and the basic structure of this document. The author would also like to thank Henrik Levkowetz, Alfred Hoenes, John Klensin, Pasi Eronen, Robert Sparks, Spencer Dawkins, Russ Housley, Paul Hoffman, Mary Barnes, Glenn Parsons, Marc Blanchet, Andy Malis, other WG chairs, and everyone who participated in the wgdtspec BOF at IETF 77 for their insights, discussions, comments and suggestions. This document was initially prepared using 2-Word-v2.0.template.dot. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 17] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 Appendix A: "IESG Document" States This Appendix describes the status information currently stored in the IETF Datatracker tool for every I-D submitted to the IESG for publication. The terms and definitions herein are as in [IDSTATES]. It must be noted that I-Ds sent to the IESG for publication (termed "IESG Documents" in this Appendix) do not stay with the IESG until the day they are published as RFCs. After evaluation, the IESG may declare that some I-Ds deserve a "Do Not Publish" label. Other I-Ds may become "Dead". Some I-Ds may get sent back to their originators (WGs or otherwise), and the rest may go into the RFC Editor queue. A.1. Definition of "IESG Document" States A.1.1. I-D Exists This is an initial (default) state for all newly submitted Internet- Drafts. Such documents are not tracked by the IESG as no request has been made of the IESG to do anything with an I-D in this state. A.1.2. Publication Requested A formal request has been made to advance/publish the document, following the procedures in Section 7.5 of RFC 2418 [RFC2418]; the request could be from a WG Chair, or from an individual. Note: the Secretariat (iesg-secretary@ietf.org) is copied on these requests to ensure that the request makes it into the Datatracker. A document in this state has not (yet) been reviewed by an Area Director nor has any official action been taken yet, other than to note that its publication has been requested. A.1.3. AD Evaluation A specific Area Director (AD) for the working group has begun his/her review of the document to verify that it is ready for advancement. The shepherding AD is responsible for doing any necessary review before starting an IETF Last Call or sending the document directly to the IESG as a whole. A.1.4. Expert Review An AD may ask for an expert review by an external party as part of evaluating whether a document is ready for advancement. MIBs, for example, are reviewed by "MIB doctors". Other types of reviews may also be requested (e.g., security, operations impacts, etc.). Documents remain in this state until the review is completed and Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 18] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 possibly until the issues raised in the review are addressed. Specific details on the nature of the review may be found in the "note" field associated with this state (i.e. within the Datatracker). A.1.5. Last Call Requested The AD has requested that the Secretariat start an IETF Last Call, but the actual Last Call message has not been sent yet. A.1.6. In Last Call The document is currently waiting for IETF Last Call to complete. Last Calls for WG documents typically last 2 weeks, and those for individual submissions last 4 weeks. A.1.7. Waiting for Write-up Before a standards-track or BCP document is formally considered by the entire IESG, the AD must write-up a protocol action. The protocol action is included in the approval message that the Secretariat sends out when the document is approved for publication as an RFC. A.1.8. Waiting for AD Go-Ahead As a result of the IETF Last Call, comments may need to be responded to and a revision of the I-D may be needed as well. The AD is responsible for verifying that all Last Call comments have been adequately addressed and that the (possibly revised) document is ready for consideration by the IESG as a whole. A.1.9. IESG Evaluation The document is being formally reviewed by the entire IESG. Documents are discussed in email or during a bi-weekly IESG telechat. In this phase, each AD reviews the document and airs any issues she/he may have. Unresolvable issues are documented as "discuss" comments that can be forwarded to the authors/WG. See the description of IESG substates in Section A.2 for additional details about the current state of the IESG discussion. A.1.10. IESG Evaluation - Defer During a telechat, one or more ADs requested an additional two weeks to review the document. A defer is designed to be an exception Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 19] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 mechanism, and can only be invoked once, the first time the document comes up for discussion during a telechat. A.1.11. Approved - Announcement to be sent The IESG has approved the document for publication, but the Secretariat has not (yet) sent an official approval message. A.1.12. Approved - Announcement sent The IESG has approved the document for publication, and the Secretariat has sent out the official approval message to the RFC editor. A.1.13. RFC Ed Queue The document is in the RFC editor Queue (as confirmed by http://www.rfc-editor.org/queue2.html) A.1.14. RFC Published The I-D has been published as an RFC. A.1.15. DNP - Waiting for AD note Do Not Publish: The IESG recommends against publishing the document, but the write-up explaining its reasoning has not yet been produced. DNPs apply primarily to individual submissions. More information on who has the action item should be recorded in the "note" field associated with this state (i.e. within the Datatracker). A.1.16. DNP - Announcement to be sent The IESG recommends against publishing the document. A write-up explaining the IESG's reasoning has been produced, but the Secretariat has not yet sent out the official "do not publish" recommendation message. A.1.17. AD is Watching An AD is aware of the document and has chosen to place the document in a separate state in order to monitor it (for whatever reason). Documents in this state are not actively tracked by the IESG in the sense that no formal request has been made to publish or advance the document. The AD has chosen to put the I-D into this state, to make it easier to keep track of (for his or her own reasons). Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 20] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 A.1.18. Dead The document is "Dead" and is no longer being tracked (e.g., it has been replaced by another document having a different name, it has been withdrawn, etc.). A.2. IESG Document Substates A.2.1. Point Raised - Write-up needed IESG discussions on the document have raised some issues that need to be brought to the attention of the authors/WG, but those issues have not been written down yet. (It is common for discussions during a telechat to result in such situations. An AD may raise a possible issue during a telechat and only decide as a result of that discussion whether the issue is worth formally writing up and bringing to the attention of the authors/WG). A document stays in the "Point Raised - write-up needed" substate until *ALL* IESG comments that were raised have been documented. A.2.2. AD Follow-up "AD Follow-up" is a generic substate indicating that the shepherding AD has the action to determine the appropriate next steps. In particular, the appropriate steps (and the corresponding next state or substate) depend entirely on the nature of the issues that were raised and can only be decided with active involvement of the shepherding AD. Examples include: - if another AD raises an issue, the shepherding AD may first iterate with the other AD to get a better understanding of the exact issue. Or, the shepherding AD may attempt to argue that the issue is not serious enough it to bring to the attention of the authors/WG. - if a documented issue is forwarded to a WG, some further iteration may be needed before it can be determined whether a new revision is needed or whether the WG response to an issue clarifies the issue sufficiently. - when a new revision appears, the shepherding AD will first look at the changes to determine whether they believe all outstanding issues have been raised satisfactorily, prior to asking the ADs who raised the original issues to verify the changes. Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 21] Internet-Draft Working Group Document States May 2010 A.2.3. External Party The document is awaiting review or input from an external party (i.e, someone other than the shepherding AD, the authors, or the WG). See the "note" field for more details on who has the action. A.2.4. Revised I-D Needed An updated I-D is needed to address the issues that have been raised. Author's Address Ed Juskevicius TrekAhead PO Box 491, Carp, ON CANADA Email: edj.etc@gmail.com Juskevicius Expires November 2, 2010 [Page 22]