RE: [Process] Should we adopt a waiting period on resolutions?

> In practice this means that, for example, for any serious issues, a Pull
Request should not be merged before the next meeting

 

By serious we might want to clarify that this refers to class 3 and 4
changes. I don't think we want to run a consensus call on every editorial
change that comes up. For those, I typically wait for at least one or two
reviewers to okay a pull request and then merge.

 

Matt

 

From: Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org> 
Sent: March 26, 2025 12:17 AM
To: Brady Duga <bradyduga@gmail.com>
Cc: W3C PM Working Group <public-pm-wg@w3.org>
Subject: Re: [Process] Should we adopt a waiting period on resolutions?

 

Brady,

 

this is what our charter says (which is a boilerplate text for all new
charters these days):

 

> To afford asynchronous decisions and organizational deliberation, any
resolution (including publication decisions) taken in a face-to-face meeting
or teleconference will be considered provisional. A call for consensus (CfC)
will be issued for all resolutions (for example, via email, GitHub issue or
web-based survey), with a response period from 5 to 10 working days,
depending on the chair's evaluation of the group consensus on the issue. If
no objections are raised by the end of the response period, the resolution
will be considered to have consensus as a resolution of the Working Group.

 

I believe we made a decision many years ago, that the "CfC" is issued by
documenting the resolution in the minutes (marking it as "Resolution"), and
the minutes being announced (usually by me) to the WG after each meeting,
with a commenting period of 5 working days (unless explicitly stated to be
longer). In practice this means that, with weekly calls, the resolution
becomes officially binding at the next meeting. In practice this means that,
for example, for any serious issues, a Pull Request should not be merged
before the next meeting (although it is possible, it is complicated to
"un-merge" it).

 

Of course, in exceptional cases, a separate mail based CfC can also be
issued. And, as you say, there may be obvious cases (eg, purely editorial
issues) where we can shorten this approach.

 

Does this answer your question?

 

Ivan

 

 

On 25 Mar 2025, at 18:27, Brady Duga <bradyduga@gmail.com
<mailto:bradyduga@gmail.com> > wrote:

 

I think we have previously had a vote on the call for specific resolutions,
but not everyone is on the call and may miss important topics. This has
largely been fine for the bug fix type issues we have discussed recently,
but may not be inclusive enough as we start to work on bigger issues. I note
that the CSS WG has been issuing resolution statements in the issue at
github, which is CCed to the mailing list giving people 7 days to comment,
or apply an emoji in support of the resolution. Should we adopt a similar
process? 

 

Apologies if this is already being covered by the chairs, or if I missed
something.

 


----
Ivan Herman, W3C 
Home: http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/
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