Re: [w3c/browser-payment-api] Migrate PaymentRequest text from arch to payment request spec. (#110)

> There have been changes that try to make the "architecture" document into something that more broadly describes the overall system we're working on. This inevitably leads to some disagreement about the scope of the document as well as particular content. It's not clear to me that we need a document to does this.

It’s not clear to me either. In years of helping manage work on specs for the platform, I can’t think of any other cases where we felt we needed a doc like the one this one seems to be evolving into. Certainly I can say that we got plenty of complex interrelated technologies specced out with such a doc.

So I feel like we are making the mistake of placing a lot more importance on this doc than it merits. It is not at all clear there is broad interest in it. And certainly, especially relative to the browser API spec, etc., it is not something that is absolutely necessary to get interoperable implementations, nor something that is necessary as far as W3C process is concerned, and getting specs to Recommendation is concerned.

So it seems like there is a significant opportunity cost to the architecture doc in the scope to which it seems to have evolved now. Everybody involved has a discrete amount of time available, and time we continue to spend on the architecture doc is time that could have been spent on, e.g., actually getting blocking issues on the API spec resolved, so that implementations can move forward, and so that we can get the spec to CR in a reasonable amount of time without needing to go back to W3C management and explain why the team contacts and the chairs couldn’t manage to get our work done on time.

> Since the goal of the architecture document was only ever to publish a working group note, perhaps we can move some of the content into the WG wiki as explanation for some of the early decisions

I think that’s an excellent concrete suggestion that would also allow the members of the WG who actually care about the contents—as well as members of the community—to more easily collaborate on the contents without obstacles in their way.

> and then remove the architecture document.

Yes

> I think it is a waste of the groups resources to devote so much energy into wrangling out a WG Note when we have more important issues to discuss.

Yeah, which is what I tried to say in bit more detail above.

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