[Bug 9894] New: The chairs should be required to ensure that decisions result in consistent specifications

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=9894

           Summary: The chairs should be required to ensure that decisions
                    result in consistent specifications
           Product: HTML WG
           Version: unspecified
          Platform: PC
        OS/Version: All
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: working group Decision Policy
        AssignedTo: dave.null@w3.org
        ReportedBy: ian@hixie.ch
         QAContact: public-html-bugzilla@w3.org
                CC: mjs@apple.com, Paul.Cotton@microsoft.com,
                    rubys@intertwingly.net, mike@w3.org


The decision process currently leads to decisions that make the spec
inconsistent. For example, the recent decision to remove a paragraph of
implementation advice in one section left another paragraph with essentially
the same advice untouched, and left dozens of other paragraphs with similar
advice alone.

The process should be changed to require that the chairs ensure that working
group decisions are based on general guidelines that can be consistently
applied to the whole specification (or group of specifications, where
appropriate).

For example, in the case above, the working group decision could have been "the
html specification should not include optional implementation advice", or "the
html specification should not attempt to improve accessibility" or "the html
specification should not acknowledge the possibility of authors making
authoring mistakes", each of which would result in the paragraph being removed
but would _also_ result in the spec being consistently updated so that it
remained coherent.

This change should be retroactive (i.e. should require previous decisions to be
explained in terms of general principles). Without such guidance, I'm unable to
effectively execute my duties as editor.

-- 
Configure bugmail: http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/userprefs.cgi?tab=email
------- You are receiving this mail because: -------
You are the QA contact for the bug.

Received on Wednesday, 9 June 2010 20:36:13 UTC