proposal process replies

   I'm pretty satisfied as to the state of things at the moment. And,
although I may not have sounded like it, I'm not worried that there are any
plots going on. But I do think that the communication problem looks
different from the outside than the inside of the ERB. If I had been aware
that Eliot's draft was serving as a discussion draft within the ERB, I
might have commented on it in a different and more intensive way.  I chose
to concentrate on the semantics implied by Eliot's draft, more-or-less
ignoring all XML-syntactic and human-terminological issues.

    And I weighed it in the balance roughly the same as the many other
threads on the list, and my own less polished proposals. My worry isn't
that the unguided discussion has not been fruitful, but I would have rather
known that issues were being listed and explicit yeas/nays solicited in
advance of the drafting process. Alternatively, I would have felt better
with a posting from the ERB as soon as they decided, to the effect that
"Eliot's proposal looks like a good starting point, propose any
revisions/objections now". Even better would have been a posting that this
important issue of the starting point for a draft is up for a vote at
such-and-such a time, and Eliot's proposal is the current candidate.

   From what Jon and Tim are saying I think that the intended effect is the
same as what I wanted, but it is rather a shock to find out things that are
well under way when you've been engaged in "warm-up" discussions.

   I know that fully documenting every word of ERB meetings would be
sufficiently onerous to slow if not halt progree, and would be relatively
useless besides. But the reports of ERB and editor decisions and actions
really do help those of us on the outside feel involved.

   I look forward to seeing a proposal, and will sharpen up my exacto
knives in anticipation.

    -- David

I am not a number. I am an undefined character.
_________________________________________
David Durand              dgd@cs.bu.edu  \  david@dynamicDiagrams.com
Boston University Computer Science        \  Sr. Analyst
http://www.cs.bu.edu/students/grads/dgd/   \  Dynamic Diagrams
--------------------------------------------\  http://dynamicDiagrams.com/
MAPA: mapping for the WWW                    \__________________________

Received on Tuesday, 21 January 1997 23:57:04 UTC