Re: WWW2004 panel (agenda item today's telcon)

David,

Thanks for your proposal. Running the risk of being repetitive; at some 
telcon I volounteered for the idealist position (currently proposed to 
be held by M. Skall). Could it be put on the agenda to be discussed on 
today's telcon? I suppose we'd have some kind of voting, but haven't 
seen any in the minutes or in the previous meetings.

Best,

/Dimitris
On Thursday, Dec 4, 2003, at 20:24 Europe/Athens, 
david_marston@us.ibm.com wrote:

>
> Lofton writes:
> >I don't recall seeing "final" submission that David sent in.
>
> Here it is. NOTE: we can still send in panelist names, and we probably 
> should if we can identify a "person who suffers from lack of interop", 
> as in person#6 below.
>
> Panel title: Is interoperability a futile quest?
>
> Abstract: We begin by describing the new-in-2003 W3C guidelines that 
> will make interoperability more provable. W3C Working Groups (WGs) 
> will present a more integrated view of their requirements in the 
> future, by providing tests in addition to specs. Then we will broaden 
> our range to all the organizations attempting to set standards and 
> guidelines for the Internet, looking at how notions of "conformance" 
> should drive interoperability. Sanctioned conformance tests supplement 
> marketplace pressure, but sanctioning them is more work for the WGs. 
> The volunteer/contributed efforts in the WGs are hard-pressed to serve 
> the ideals of interoperability.
>
> Associated themes/tracks of conference:
>     Web standards: de-facto vs de-jure
>     Performance and Reliability
>     Web Engineering
>     Vendor independence
>
> Proposer: David Marston, IBM T. J. Watson Research Center
>     mail: One Rogers Street
>           Cambridge, MA  02142
>    email: David_Marston@us.ibm.com
>     voice: +1 617 693 5370
>     fax: +1 617 693 5551 (also notify via phone or email if you sent 
> me a fax)
>
> Panelist candidates (not necessarily guaranteed to be available; 
> actual size of panel might be smaller):
> 1. Mark Skall, Chief of the Software Diagnostics and Conformance 
> Testing Division at NIST (US govt.),
>   Member of W3C Quality Assurance WG, generally familiar with 
> government vendor-neutral acquisition
>   Likely roles: idealist, buyer/user
> 2. Patrick Curran, Manager of Java Conformance Kit development at Sun 
> Microsystems,
>   oversees development of a test suite that permits/denies use of the 
> Java brand,
>   Member of W3C Quality Assurance WG
>   Likely roles: idealist, enforcer of standards, QA Manager
> 3. David Cruikshank, Technical Fellow at Boeing, former CTO of CGM 
> Open, member of various WGs,
>   co-author of W3C WebCGM
>   Likely roles: power user, specification editor
> 4. G. Ken Holman, well-known trainer and author on XML/XSL topics, 
> past member of various WGs
>   Likely roles: author (who depends on spec stability), test 
> developer, pragmatist
> 5. Thierry Kormann, member of Batik WG
>   Likely roles: implementer of specs, pragmatist
> 6. (name pending), Activist on W3C mailing lists about enforcement and 
> validation
>   Likely roles: pragmatist, person who suffers from lack of interop
>
> Moderator candidate:
>   David Marston, Software Engineer with QA expertise at IBM Research 
> (25+ years experience)
>   Member of various WGs, author of hundreds of XSLT and XQuery tests, 
> Member of Apache Xalan project
>   Appeared as panelist or moderator at various conferences since 1992
>
> Discussion plan: Start by distinguishing between the illusion and 
> reality of interoperability; competing products claim to implement the 
> same standards but exhibit different behavior. Ways to respond: accept 
> the differences, require tests to enforce the specs, reduce 
> variability in the specs, use marketplace forces such as negative 
> reviews in the trade press. Bring up bad experiences associated with 
> each kind of response. Then, depending on audience interest, pick 
> other issues from prepared list seen under "Assurance of liveliness" 
> below.
>
> Length: 90 minutes
>
> Intended audience: Implementers and users of Web standards, especially 
> those who rely on conformance and interoperability. By implication, 
> this includes all users of the Web.
>
> Take-home message: Audience members go away thinking about the 
> limitations of the W3C and similar bodies, or become willing to 
> support greater investment in the foundations of interoperability, 
> and/or become more likely to buy conformant products.
>
> Assurance of liveliness: Any discussion of standards vs. proprietary 
> approaches is a good stimulus. How is Web interop faring in 2003? Are 
> the W3C Recs suitably constraining? Do SHOULD statements in the Rec 
> have enough moral authority? Are localization and interop opposed to 
> each other? When the WGs issue tests as well as Recs, how do we 
> benefit? Does rapid issuance of new standards and Recs help or hinder 
> achievement of the interop goals? How do WG volunteers balance 
> interests of their employers against those of the consortium?
>
> Supporting materials: Panelists will be discouraged from preparing 
> slides. During the advance preparation phase, panelists will be asked 
> if there is value in showing good and bad examples currently existing 
> on the Web. Should this idea be embraced, we would want live Web 
> access.
>
> Other information about the topic:
> The Quality Assurance WG of the W3C has issued Operational and 
> Specification Guidelines, now at the Candidate Recommendation stage, 
> and has Test Guidelines progressing through drafts. A frequent point 
> of contention is whether each WG needs to write "test materials" and 
> provide additional markup in their specification documents to ensure 
> that the implementers follow the WG's requirements. Meanwhile, several 
> companies founded the Web Services Interoperability Organization, not 
> to issue new standards, but to provide extra pressure and support for 
> adoption of standards (or pseudo-standards) already published. Why is 
> such an organization considered necessary? Most companies that support 
> these consortia seem to have a fixed number of people that they will 
> assign to WG work, and most WG chairs can attest to attrition on their 
> WGs.
>
> Advance coordination:
> Once panelists are confirmed, Moderator will send above issues and 
> questions as a starter list and ask for more of the same. The 
> consolidated topics will be sent around to the panelists and each 
> panelist will be asked to think about whether they have a stance on 
> each topic and also to estimate the likelihood of each topic rousing 
> the audience. Through follow-up emails and phone calls, Moderator will 
> determine which panelists have a burning need to address each topic. 
> Topics which are anticipated to have a wide range of opinion will 
> receive higher priority.

Received on Monday, 8 December 2003 02:37:03 UTC