RE: Evergreen Formal Objection handling (ESFO)

I am a little confused by this discussion. We seem to be going in a direction that takes us far away from W3C Process and intent. Chris and I were tasked with coming up with language about consensus, but I am truly puzzled about what is so different about the ES process and the REC track process when it comes to both consensus and FO.

My impression is that the way that most REC track WGs work when they are in the writing phase is not dissimilar from ES. Editors have discretion to make changes to documents, but that writing should reflect the intent and consensus of the WG. If there are concerns about changes to documents, even merged pull requests, they are raised to the group and discussed. Pull Requests can be retracted. That is why we have version control.

The process outlined by Chris from the WHATWG seems to ignore the concept of an active and functional WG with a chair. I don’t think we need to add the Director overriding an FO. Why make this a Director responsibility? WGs resolve issues like this on a regular basis today.

Can’t we simply state:  Evergreen Standards are a part of the W3C Process and must follow the rules of Consensus [1], including resolving objections.

[1] https://www.w3.org/2019/Process-20190301/#Consensus.



Tzviya Siegman
Information Standards Lead
Wiley
201-748-6884
tsiegman@wiley.com<mailto:tsiegman@wiley.com>

From: Jeff Jaffe <jeff@w3.org>
Sent: Thursday, March 14, 2019 2:46 PM
To: Chris Wilson <cwilso@google.com>
Cc: David Singer <singer@apple.com>; W3C Process CG <public-w3process@w3.org>; Philippe Le Hegaret <plh@w3.org>
Subject: Re: Evergreen Formal Objection handling (ESFO)


Thanks, Chris.  This helps a lot.

So modeling a FO objection policy after this (which is consistent with the current FO policy), I suppose we only need to say that the Director can override an Editor's decision.  Correct?

Jeff
On 3/14/2019 2:11 PM, Chris Wilson wrote:
In short, the WHATWG Workstream Policy (https://whatwg.org/workstream-policy) says "Editors are responsible for the technical content of their Workstreams", and the "Steering Group appoints and may remove the Editor for each Workstream".

The core of responsibilities is in https://whatwg.org/workstream-policy#relationships-with-other-groups:


  1.  Editors must respond to substantive issues raised by Workstream Participants in their Workstreams. Editors have discretion to resolve issues based on available information.
  2.  If a Workstream Participant is not satisfied with an issue resolution, they may request that the Editor revisit the issue. If not satisfied with an Editor's final response, Workstream Participants may appeal to the Steering Group.
  3.  Editors may solicit input from Workstream Participants, and may consider and respond to comments, suggestions, and objections from Contributors and the public.
The conflict resolution policy is just below it, in https://whatwg.org/workstream-policy#decision-making:


  1.  Editors may commit changes to their Living Standards without further review, provided they are adhering to the requirements above.
  2.  The Steering Group may override an Editor's decision, or remove an Editor.
So in short: Editors are responsible for responding to all issues.  If a participant is unhappy with the Editor's (repeated) response to an issue, they should appeal to the Steering Group, which may override or remove the Editor.  (This would, of course, be somewhat catastrophic, so in practice, working with consensus approval is highly encouraged, and is the norm.)

I would point out that the Working Mode of the WHATWG also has a high bar for what goes IN to a Living Standard, as laid out in https://whatwg.org/working-mode#changes:


    Each normative change made to the standard needs to meet the following criteria:

  1.  It must have support from implementers.
  2.  It should have corresponding test changes, either in the form of new tests or modifications to existing tests.
  3.  Implementations bugs must be filed for each user agent that fails tests. (This is each user agent that doesn’t match the proposed changes. If the test changes are not adequate to reveal that, but it’s known through other means, the tests should be improved first.)
  4.  It should have been reviewed by one or more members of the community.
  5.  Optional or implementation-defined behavior must be very well motivated.
Another thing of note - Editors MAY (but are not required to) tag text as "Object Pending" or "Under Discussion", as stated in https://whatwg.org/workstream-policy#optional-tags.


On Wed, Mar 13, 2019 at 4:01 PM Jeff Jaffe <jeff@w3.org<mailto:jeff@w3.org>> wrote:


On 3/13/2019 6:19 PM, Chris Wilson wrote:
I note that this is, in fact, a quite complex bit of Process, and wonder (as Mike has introduced) if we would be better served with a process more akin to the Living Standard process we used in the WHATWG; putting FOs into the document itself, although I understand the rationale, seems like an attack vector for those who disagree.

I'm interested in learning more about "a process more akin to the LS process".  I don't know much about the WHATWG process.  Can you suggest some process-text which would characterize what you mean?



I'd again suggest that the Chair should be more responsible for maintaining consensus.  (And yes, I have an action item to propose some text.  Was this moving to a repo somewhere, or should I just do this in email?)

On Wed, Mar 13, 2019 at 12:51 PM Jeff Jaffe <jeff@w3.org<mailto:jeff@w3.org>> wrote:

Thanks, David.  I generally agree with your direction.  Many comments on the minutiae.  (And shouldn't we have this discussion on github?)
On 3/13/2019 2:38 PM, David Singer wrote:

Hi



here’s my suggestion. Replace this



 • must ensure Director review of all pending formal objections before 24 months have elapsed.

ISSUE-FO: what happens if the Group refuses to accept the Director's resolution? Some ideas:

         • The Working Group ceases its work

         • The Working Group is no longer allowed to publish an ERS

         • The document header indicates that the Director disagrees with some parts of the document



with



If a Formal Objection is raised against an Evergreen Standard:

We need a time interval that guarantees that a FO will be taken up and resolved within some bounded amount of time.  The current text says 24 months, which may be too long.  What do people think?

* Until it is resolved, all copies (including the working group’s working draft, and the document linked as the current ES)
We don't have WDs for Evergreen.  So it suffices to say that the ER MUST document the FO in the header.


 MUST document the existence of the unresolved FO in the document header, and SHOULD document it also in the body of the text near the subject material;
Not clear to me why this SHOULD isn't a MUST.


* After resolution, the current ES must either reflect the decision (the Director’s decision, or the agreement reached with the consensus of the WG and objector under which they withdraw their FO), or cease to be published; if the working draft or other documents of the WG do not reflect the decision, the FO marking MUST be retained.

Instead of having all of the notes, it might be cleaner to have:

Resolution:

  *   If the FO is rejected, the FO documentation is removed from the header and the document
  *   If the FO is accepted, the document MUST reflect the Director's decision if it is to continue as an ER.  If the Working Group does not agree, then options include:

     *   Removing the ER designation and publishing as a Note
     *   Reverting to an earlier version of the ER which does not have the objection
     *   Returning to a Preliminary Draft stage until a consensus can be found for the objection

  *   If the Director, objector, and WG develop a different consensus approach, then that approach is put into the document and the FO documentation is removed

Note: if the FO is rejected, the markings are removed. If the FO is upheld, and the document can be easily adjusted (e.g. removal of an ‘atomic' feature), this should be straightforward. In complex cases, the ES may need to revert to a state to which the FO does not apply, and if there is no such state, return to provisional status with no ES publication.



Note: resolution can include reaching an agreement with the objector and the objector withdrawing their FO in favor of this resolution.



Note: the Director’s decision can, of course, be appealed.



Note: there are too many Notes here.







David Singer

Manager, Software Standards, Apple Inc.