Re: Proposed Activity Proposal, Charter

On Friday 17 August 2001 17:04, Blair Dillaway wrote:
> 6. Requirements: Limiting implementations to 'mandatory portions'
> doesn't seem right.  Doesn't the W3C require implementation of all
> REQUIRED and RECOMMENDED features?

Correct, and I've now fixed the Encryption charter to read, "All required, 
recommended, and optional features ..."

> 8. Duration and Milestones:
> 	-A question for Joeseph/Danny - is the Oct F2F reasonable given
> the 8 week notification requirement?
> 	- don't believe requirements documents have a 'Last Call'.

It's still a useful milestone because I typically don't push a requirements 
document beyond Last Call and asking "does everyone agree these are our 
requirements?" is still an important feature.

> 10. IPR Disclosure: In the last paragraph,the "principal authors of the
> XKMS protocol" need to be identified somewhere.  Maybe a ref to the XKMS
> Note?  But, I suggest we just strike this last  paragraph and just
> include the basic language proposing royalty free licensing.  If we
> reference an MOU then we probably need to make it available which seems
> like more trouble then its worth.

I think we're going to have to go to the trouble. In the submission [1], some 
of the submitters made it clear that derivative works were permitted and that 
any patents would be available RF (royalty free), others were less clear 
about derivative works and stated a RAND (reasonable and non-discriminatory) 
license would be available. This is fine for a NOTE, but not for a 
deliverable of a WG.

[1] http://www.w3.org/Submission/2001/08/

The quickie breakdown is:

A. Permits derivative works and grants Royalty Free license for patents:
Microsoft Corporation, VeriSign Inc., webMethods Inc., Citigroup, Reuters 
Limited.

B. Unstated terms for derivative works and RAND License for patents:
Baltimore Technologies, Hewlett-Packard Company, International Business 
Machines Corporation, IONA Technologies, PureEdge

So clarifying the right of the W3C to make a derivative work treated solely 
under the W3C license is fairly easy, I wrote boiler-plate [2] for that for 
the SOAP submission that I'd have to get the companies in class B to agree 
to. The patent issue is a tough nut to crack and is currently the critical 
path issue for a number of new activities at the W3C. If you already have a 
MOU, that's very convenient because this issue would probably be the biggest 
source of delay in starting the activity.

> 11. W3C Team commitment: Per our discussions, I thought the W3C staff
> indicated they didn't want to co-chair or edit. So why the parenthetical
> note?  Maybe Joeseph or Danny can suggest text more explicitly defining
> their role?

"The W3C Team will dedicate 20% of a single person to this activity for 
active WG participation and the Staff Contact role: liasoning with other 
Staff Contacts of identified WGs, and advising the Chair and WG on W3C 
Process and Publishing."

Finally, I don't expect the XKMS to have representation on XML CG. They're 
kind of stingy with that (they like to keep it small) and invite folks with 
mutual bi-directional dependencies: xmldsig nor xenc have been members. I'd 
expect the list name would be www-xkms@w3.org (folks are trying to make our 
conventions for list names between public/member more consistent) and the URI 
of the activity would be http://www.w3.org/2001/XKMS (like Encryption had to 
do).


[2] Declaration of [Submitter]
 
    [Submitter] hereby grants to the W3C, a perpetual, nonexclusive,
    royalty-free, world-wide right and license under any [Submitter]
    copyrights in this contribution to copy, publish and distribute the
    contribution, as well as a right and license of the same scope to any
    derivative works prepared by the W3C and based on, or incorporating all
    or part of the contribution. [Submitter] further agrees that any
    derivative works of this contribution prepared by the W3C shall be
    solely owned by the W3C.

Received on Monday, 20 August 2001 15:13:57 UTC