Re: small logistics reminder - meeting minutes -

"The archived mailing list www-qa-wg@w3.org is the primary means of 
discussion within the group."

http://www.w3.org/QA/WG/charter.html
http://www.w3.org/QA/IG/charter.html

Olivier,

Thanks for your message.  The same issues have been on my mind lately.

At 10:06 AM 7/9/02 +0900, Olivier Thereaux wrote:
>[...]
>Sorry to point out such a trivial issue, but it seems we're not doing
>our job of keeping the QAIG informed of our work very well.

It's not a trivial issue.  We need to find a way to keep vigorous dialogs 
alive, similar to the ones in May (which happened after we announced the 
Glossary and the FPWD of the Spec GL part to the IG list).

It is not a simple issue (see more below).  I'll put it on the Wednesday 
agenda for some discussion.


>* www-qa[1] has 2 messages in July and 14 in June, whereas www-qa-wg[2] has 21
>and 94. Let me remind you our commitment that "the QA work/discussion is
>done in public" and that "the WG list should be kept for logistics or
>issues that do not interest everyone".

Some miscellaneous ...

1.) I agree that the work and discussion benefits from discussion and 
contributions from outside of the core WG group.

2.) However, at the same time we to have need a reliably (regularly) 
participating core group for the ultimate resolution of issues and the 
progression of the work.  The reliable/regular aspect is not trivial.  It 
is pretty difficult to progress to consensus if the core group -- 
responsible for closing issues, moving forward, publishing -- is constantly 
shifting.

3.) I have tried to recruit several people -- for example from the "test 
assertion" email thread -- for more active participation, without 
success.  So the challenge is to increase the dialog, whilst keeping a core 
group ultimately responsible for decisions and progressing the work.

4.) IG participation seems to peak after milestones (about every 1-2 
months) when we publish something.  "Publish" doesn't necessarily mean 
/TR/, but it does mean somewhat more polished than, e.g., the SpecGL draft 
that I posted yesterday.

5.) This is why I have pushed to publish SpecGL again in August, instead of 
October, and why I have been trying to push for completion of 
AI-2002-06-14-05 (identify the 5-10 key issues in the IG "test assertions" 
thread, so that we can restart discussion).

6.) I have reread the WG and IG charters "The archived mailing list 
www-qa-wg@w3.org is the primary means of discussion within the group."   On 
the other hand, at Brussels we said, "resolved: going to try to use the WG 
list only for logistic stuff: teleconf info, regrets, minor revisions to 
specs.(?)"

7.) The fact that the WG list is public means that, technically, the work 
is "done in public".  But there still is a visibility problem, and there 
still is the tension in #1 and #2 above.  For example, should this 
excellent detailed contribution from Mark go onto the WG list or the IG list...

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-qa-wg/2002Jul/0017.html.

What to do?  Some random ideas:

-- (discuss at 7/10 telecon)
-- "Week in QA" reviews also point into WG archive
-- point out telecon agendas to IG
-- any IG can join telecon, by prior notification to a chair.
-- more aggressive "call out" of generally interesting issues to IG (this 
is a variant of the "Week in QA" issue above).

Those are fairly uncontroversial, tho' the degree to which they will help 
is uncertain.  This one might be less obvious...

-- all technical discussion on IG list (???)


>* our group "process"[3] states that :
>   - [after a week for review of draft minutes] Scribe circulates
>   "Final Minutes" to the WG mailing list, www-qa-wg@w3.org
>   - QA co-chair (any one) sends simple email announcement to IG
>Correct me if I'm wrong, but I have not seen final minutes for the f2f,
>nor June 27, nor July 3rd. As a consequence, the Calendar [4] is
>seriously missing information

Yes, it is.  Jack (6/27) is on vacation.  Karl, Peter are remiss (or 
late).  Dimitris (7/3) has until COB today ("one week") to post FINAL and 
point it out to IG list.

Should we automatically post an AI, "A-2002-MM-DD-0" at each telecon, with 
a one-week deadline, "Integrate comments and corrections, mail final to WG 
list, send message to IG list."?

>Generally speaking, it's been about a month without communication
>between the IG and WG, and I feel there's something very wrong in this
>new trend.

I completely agree.

>I suggest we discuss this and take action tomorrow during the
>telcon.

-Lofton.