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IETF RFC 4858
Document Shepherding from Working Group Last Call to Publication
Last modified on Wednesday, May 2nd, 2007
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Network Working Group H. Levkowetz
Request for Comments: 4858 Ericsson
Category: Informational D. Meyer
Cisco/University of Oregon
L. Eggert
Nokia
A. Mankin
May 2007
Document Shepherding from Working Group Last Call to Publication
 Status of This Memo
This memo provides information for the Internet community. It does
not specify an Internet standard of any kind. Distribution of this
memo is unlimited.
Copyright Notice
Copyright © The IETF Trust (2007).
Abstract
This document describes methodologies that have been designed to
improve and facilitate IETF document flow processing. It specifies a
set of procedures under which a working group chair or secretary
serves as the primary Document Shepherd for a document that has been
submitted to the IESG for publication. Before this, the Area
Director responsible for the working group has traditionally filled
the shepherding role.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3. Process Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3.1. Document Shepherd Write-Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.2. Document Shepherding during AD Evaluation . . . . . . . . 9
3.3. Document Shepherding during IESG Evaluation . . . . . . . 10
4. Shepherding the Document's IANA Actions . . . . . . . . . . . 13
5. Document Shepherding after IESG Approval . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6. When Not to Use the Document Shepherding Process . . . . . . . 15
7. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
8. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
9. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
10. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
10.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
10.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Appendix A. Example Document Announcement Write-Ups . . . . . . . 18
A.1. Example Document Announcement Write-Up for
draft-ietf-avt-rtp-midi-format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
A.2. Example Document Announcement Write-Up for
draft-ietf-imss-ip-over-fibre-channel . . . . . . . . . . 19
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1. Introduction
Early in 2004, the IESG undertook several experiments aimed at
evaluating whether any of the proposed changes to the IETF document
flow process would yield qualitative improvements in document
throughput and quality. One such experiment, referred to as the
"PROTO process" or "PROTO" (because it was created by the "PROcess
and TOols" or PROTO [PROTO] team), is a set of methodologies designed
to involve working group chairs or secretaries more directly in their
documents' approval life cycle. In particular, the PROTO team
focused on improvements to the part of a document's life cycle that
occurs after the working group and document editor have forwarded it
to the IESG for publication.
By the end of 2004, the IESG had evaluated the utility of the PROTO
methodologies based on data obtained through several pilot projects
that had run throughout the year, and subsequently decided to adopt
the PROTO process for all documents and working groups. This
document describes this process.
The methodologies developed and piloted by the PROTO team focus on
the working group chair or secretary as the primary Document
Shepherd. The primary objective of this document shepherding process
is to improve document-processing throughput and document quality by
enabling a partnership between the Responsible Area Director and the
Document Shepherd. In particular, this partnership has the explicit
goal of enfranchising the Document Shepherd while at the same time
offloading a specific part of the follow-up work that has
traditionally been responsibility of the Responsible Area Director.
The Responsible Area Director has tens or many tens of documents to
follow, while the Document Shepherd has only a few at a time.
Flowing the responsibility to the working group level can ensure more
attention and more timely response.
Consequently, the document shepherding process includes follow-up
work during all document-processing stages after Working Group Last
Call, i.e., during AD Evaluation of a document, during IESG
Evaluation, and during post-approval processing by IANA and the RFC
Editor. In these stages, it is the responsibility of the Document
Shepherd to track and follow up on feedback received on a document
from all relevant parties.
The Document Shepherd is usually a chair of the working group that
has produced the document. In consultation with the Responsible Area
Director, the chairs may instead decide to appoint the working group
secretary as the responsible Document Shepherd.
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2. Terminology
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14, RFC 2119
[RFC 2119].
3. Process Description
The document shepherding process consists of the following tasks:
o Providing the Document Shepherd Write-Up accompanying a document
that is forwarded to the IESG when publication is requested, as
described in Section 3.1.
o During AD Evaluation of the document by the Responsible Area
Director, managing the discussion between the editors, the working
group, and the Responsible Area Director, as described in
Section 3.2.
o During an IETF Last Call, if performed for the shepherded
document, following up on community feedback and review comments.
o During IESG Evaluation, following up on all IESG feedback
("DISCUSS" and "COMMENT" items) related to the shepherded
document, as described in Section 3.3.
o Following up on IANA and RFC Editor requests as described in
Section 4 and Section 5.
The shepherd must keep the document moving forward, communicating
about it with parties who review and comment on it. The shepherd
must obtain the working group's consensus for any substantive
proposed changes. The shepherd is the leader for the document and
for the working group, and maintains a critical and technical
perspective. In summary, the Document Shepherd continues to care for
a shepherded document during its post-WG lifetime just as he or she
has done while responsible for the document in the working group.
Before any document shepherding takes place, a single Document
Shepherd MUST be identified for a document (he or she will be named
in the Document Shepherd Write-Up). Frequently, the chairs and the
Responsible Area Director will decide that the working group will
adopt the PROTO process for all their future documents. After that
decision, the chairs, in consultation with the Responsible Area
Director, decide on who should act as Document Shepherd for any given
document. This is typically and by default one of the chairs of the
working group. In consultation with the Responsible Area Director,
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the chairs MAY also decide to appoint the working group secretary as
Document Shepherd for a given document. The Document Shepherd SHOULD
NOT be an editor of the shepherded document.
It is intended that the Document Shepherd role be filled by one
person during the entire shepherding process. However, situations
may occur when the Document Shepherd role may be reassigned to
different persons during the lifetime of a document. It is up to the
chairs and Responsible Area Director to identify situations when this
may become necessary, and then consult to appoint a new Document
Shepherd.
It is important to note that the document shepherding process only
applies to documents that are the product of a working group. It
does not apply to documents that originate elsewhere. Additionally,
Section 6 discusses other instances in which the document shepherding
process does not apply.
3.1. Document Shepherd Write-Up
When a working group decides that a document is ready for submission
to the IESG for publication, it is the task of the Document Shepherd
to complete a "Document Shepherd Write-Up" for the document.
There are two parts to this task. First, the Document Shepherd
answers questions (1.a) to (1.j) below to give the Responsible Area
Director insight into the working group process that applied to this
document. Note that while these questions may appear redundant in
some cases, they are written to elicit information that the
Responsible Area Director must be aware of (to this end, pointers to
relevant entries in the WG archive are helpful). The goal here is to
inform the Responsible Area Director about any issues that may have
come up in IETF meetings, on the mailing list, or in private
communication that they should be aware of prior to IESG Evaluation
of the shepherded document. Any significant issues mentioned in the
questionnaire will probably lead to a follow-up discussion with the
Responsible Area Director.
The second part of the task is to prepare the "Document Announcement
Write-Up" that is input both to the ballot for the IESG telechat and
to the eventual IETF-wide announcement message. Item number (1.k)
describes the elements of the Document Announcement Write-Up.
Some examples of Document Announcement Write-Ups are included in
Appendix A, and there are many more examples with subject lines such
as "Protocol Action" and "Document Action" in the IETF-announce
mailing list archive.
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The initial template for the Document Shepherd Write-Up is included
below, but changes are expected over time. The latest version of
this template is available from the IESG section of the IETF web
site.
(1.a) Who is the Document Shepherd for this document? Has the
Document Shepherd personally reviewed this version of the
document and, in particular, does he or she believe this
version is ready for forwarding to the IESG for publication?
(1.b) Has the document had adequate review both from key WG members
and from key non-WG members? Does the Document Shepherd have
any concerns about the depth or breadth of the reviews that
have been performed?
(1.c) Does the Document Shepherd have concerns that the document
needs more review from a particular or broader perspective,
e.g., security, operational complexity, someone familiar with
AAA, internationalization, or XML?
(1.d) Does the Document Shepherd have any specific concerns or
issues with this document that the Responsible Area Director
and/or the IESG should be aware of? For example, perhaps he
or she is uncomfortable with certain parts of the document, or
has concerns whether there really is a need for it. In any
event, if the WG has discussed those issues and has indicated
that it still wishes to advance the document, detail those
concerns here. Has an IPR disclosure related to this document
been filed? If so, please include a reference to the
disclosure and summarize the WG discussion and conclusion on
this issue.
(1.e) How solid is the WG consensus behind this document? Does it
represent the strong concurrence of a few individuals, with
others being silent, or does the WG as a whole understand and
agree with it?
(1.f) Has anyone threatened an appeal or otherwise indicated extreme
discontent? If so, please summarize the areas of conflict in
separate email messages to the Responsible Area Director. (It
should be in a separate email because this questionnaire is
entered into the ID Tracker.)
(1.g) Has the Document Shepherd personally verified that the
document satisfies all ID nits? (See
http://www.ietf.org/ID-Checklist.html and
http://tools.ietf.org/tools/idnits/.) Boilerplate checks are
not enough; this check needs to be thorough. Has the document
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met all formal review criteria it needs to, such as the MIB
Doctor, media type, and URI type reviews? If the document
does not already indicate its intended status at the top of
the first page, please indicate the intended status here.
(1.h) Has the document split its references into normative and
informative? Are there normative references to documents that
are not ready for advancement or are otherwise in an unclear
state? If such normative references exist, what is the
strategy for their completion? Are there normative references
that are downward references, as described in [RFC 3967]? If
so, list these downward references to support the Area
Director in the Last Call procedure for them [RFC 3967].
(1.i) Has the Document Shepherd verified that the document's IANA
Considerations section exists and is consistent with the body
of the document? If the document specifies protocol
extensions, are reservations requested in appropriate IANA
registries? Are the IANA registries clearly identified? If
the document creates a new registry, does it define the
proposed initial contents of the registry and an allocation
procedure for future registrations? Does it suggest a
reasonable name for the new registry? See [RFC 2434]. If the
document describes an Expert Review process, has the Document
Shepherd conferred with the Responsible Area Director so that
the IESG can appoint the needed Expert during IESG Evaluation?
(1.j) Has the Document Shepherd verified that sections of the
document that are written in a formal language, such as XML
code, BNF rules, MIB definitions, etc., validate correctly in
an automated checker?
(1.k) The IESG approval announcement includes a Document
Announcement Write-Up. Please provide such a Document
Announcement Write-Up. Recent examples can be found in the
"Action" announcements for approved documents. The approval
announcement contains the following sections:
Technical Summary
Relevant content can frequently be found in the abstract
and/or introduction of the document. If not, this may be
an indication that there are deficiencies in the abstract
or introduction.
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Working Group Summary
Was there anything in the WG process that is worth noting?
For example, was there controversy about particular points
or were there decisions where the consensus was
particularly rough?
Document Quality
Are there existing implementations of the protocol? Have a
significant number of vendors indicated their plan to
implement the specification? Are there any reviewers that
merit special mention as having done a thorough review,
e.g., one that resulted in important changes or a
conclusion that the document had no substantive issues? If
there was a MIB Doctor, Media Type, or other Expert Review,
what was its course (briefly)? In the case of a Media Type
Review, on what date was the request posted?
Personnel
Who is the Document Shepherd for this document? Who is the
Responsible Area Director? If the document requires IANA
experts(s), insert 'The IANA Expert(s) for the registries
in this document are <TO BE ADDED BY THE AD>.'
The Document Shepherd MUST send the Document Shepherd Write-Up to the
Responsible Area Director and iesg-secretary@ietf.org together with
the request to publish the document. The Document Shepherd SHOULD
also send the entire Document Shepherd Write-Up to the working group
mailing list. If the Document Shepherd feels that information which
may prove to be sensitive, may lead to possible appeals, or is
personal needs to be written up, it SHOULD be sent in direct email to
the Responsible Area Director, because the Document Shepherd Write-Up
is published openly in the ID Tracker. Question (1.f) of the
Write-Up covers any material of this nature and specifies this more
confidential handling.
The Document Shepherd Write-Up is entered into the ID Tracker
[IDTRACKER] as a "Comment". The name and email address of the
Document Shepherd are entered into the ID Tracker, currently as a
"Brief Note" (this may change in the future). The email address of
the Document Shepherd MUST also be added to the "State or Version
Change Notice To" field (typically the email addresses of all working
group chairs, authors, and the secretary will be added).
Entering the name and email of the Document Shepherd into the ID
Tracker is REQUIRED to ensure that he or she will be copied on the
email exchange between the editors, chairs, the IESG, the IESG
secretariat, IANA, and the RFC Editor during the review and approval
process. There are still manual steps required for these parties to
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ensure that they include the Document Shepherd, but it is hoped that
in the future, automated tools will ensure that Document Shepherds
(and others) receive necessary communications.
The contact information for the Document Shepherd is also important
for the Gen-ART team [GEN-ART], area directorates, and other review
teams, so they can know to whom to address reviews, in addition to
the Responsible Area Director.
3.2. Document Shepherding during AD Evaluation
The steps for document shepherding during AD Evaluation are as
follows:
(2.a) The Responsible Area Director reads, evaluates, and comments
on the document, as is the case when not using the document
shepherding process. If the Responsible Area Director
determines that the document is ready for IESG Evaluation, he
or she indicates this to the Document Shepherd and the
document shepherding process continues as described in
Section 3.3.
(2.b) If the Responsible Area Director has identified issues with a
document that must be addressed before IESG Evaluation can
commence, he or she sends a full evaluation to the Document
Shepherd and SHOULD also enter the review into the ID Tracker.
(2.c) The Document Shepherd reads the AD Evaluation comments, making
very certain that all comments are understood, so that it is
possible to follow up on them with the editors and working
group. If there is some uncertainty as to what is requested,
this SHOULD be resolved with the Responsible Area Director.
(2.d) The Document Shepherd sends the AD Evaluation comments to the
editors and to the working group mailing list, in order to
have a permanent record of the comments. It is RECOMMENDED
that the Document Shepherd solicit from the editors an
estimate on when the required changes will be completed and a
revised document can be expected. Working groups that use
issue tracking SHOULD also record the issues (and eventually
their resolution) in their issue tracker.
(2.e) During the production of a revised document that addresses the
AD Evaluation comments, it is RECOMMENDED that the editors
keep a list showing how each comment was addressed and what
the revised text is. It is RECOMMENDED that this list be
forwarded to the Responsible Area Director together with the
revised document.
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(2.f) In the event that the editors or working group disagrees with
a comment raised by the Responsible Area Director or has
previously considered and dismissed the issue, the Document
Shepherd MUST resolve the issue with the Responsible Area
Director before a revised document can be submitted.
(2.g) The Document Shepherd iterates with the editors (and working
group, if required) until all outstanding issues have been
resolved and a revised document is available. At this point,
the Document Shepherd notifies the Responsible Area Director
and provides him or her with the revised document, the summary
of issues, and the resulting text changes.
(2.h) The Responsible Area Director verifies that the issues he or
she found during AD Evaluation are resolved in the revised
version of the document by starting the process described in
this section at step (2.a).
(2.i) If the document underwent an IETF Last Call and the AD
concludes that significant issues were raised during the Last
Call, then steps (2.b) through (2.h) need to be applied
addressing the Last Call issues. This requires the
Responsible Area Director to present to the Document Shepherd
those Last Call issues raised only to the IESG.
3.3. Document Shepherding during IESG Evaluation
During IESG Evaluation of a document, ADs can bring forward two kinds
of remarks about a document: DISCUSS items and COMMENT items. A
DISCUSS blocks a document's approval process until it has been
resolved; a COMMENT does not. This section details the steps that a
Document Shepherd takes to resolve any DISCUSS and COMMENT items
brought forward against a shepherded document during IESG Evaluation.
Note that DISCUSS and COMMENT items are occasionally written in a
manner that makes their intent unclear. In these cases, the Document
Shepherd SHOULD start a discussion with the ADs who brought the items
up to clarify their intent, keeping the Responsible Area Director
informed. If this fails to clarify the intent, the Responsible Area
Director may need to work towards a clarification inside the IESG.
(3.a) Leading up to the IESG conference call, the Document Shepherd
may see emails about the document from directorate reviewers
on behalf of one or more ADs and also emailed copies of
DISCUSS and COMMENT items entered into the ID Tracker. The
Document Shepherd SHOULD immediately begin to work on
resolving DISCUSS and COMMENT items with the ADs who have
raised them, keeping the Responsible Area Director copied on
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the email exchange, so that he or she is able to support the
activity during the conference call. When dealing with
directorate reviews, the Document Shepherd MUST involve the
ADs to whom these directorates report to ensure that these ADs
consider the review comments that need resolving.
(3.b) Immediately following the conference call, when the document
changes state from the "IESG Evaluation" state to one of the
states requiring Document Shepherd action, e.g., "IESG
Evaluation: Revised ID Needed" or "IESG Evaluation: AD
Followup", the Document Shepherd will receive email. A state
of "AD Followup" typically signifies the Responsible Area
Director's hope that a resolution may be possible through a
continued discussion or (more usually) through a small set of
changes as "Notes to the RFC Editor".
Note that there may be very exceptional cases when DISCUSS
items are registered after an IESG conference call. In these
cases, the AD who has raised the DISCUSS MUST notify the
Document Shepherd about it. (The notification facility in the
ID Tracker is very convenient for this purpose and also for
the cases where the DISCUSS and COMMENT items are updated
after they are partially resolved.)
(3.c) The Document Shepherd then queries the ID Tracker to collect
the remaining DISCUSS and COMMENT items raised against the
document. The Document Shepherd analyzes these items and
initializes contact with the ADs who have placed them. The
Responsible Area Director MUST be copied on all correspondence
related to active DISCUSS or COMMENT items. This does not
place the Responsible Area Director in the critical path
towards a resolution, but should keep him or her informed
about the state of the discussion.
+-------+ +-------+ +-------+
| (3.b) | -----------> | (3.c) | ------------> | (3.d) |
+-------+ Comments +-------+ Comments +-------+
collected /|\ | understood
| |
| | Comments not fully understood
| | (Further AD/Document Shepherd
| | discussion required)
+---+
(3.d) The Document Shepherd then coordinates the resolution of
DISCUSS and COMMENT items and builds a consistent
interpretation of the comments. This step is similar to much
of the process described in Section 3.2.
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+-------+ +-------+
| (3.c) | ---------------> | (3.d) |
+-------+ Consistent +-------+
/|\ interpretation |
| | Further AD/Document Shepherd
| | discussion required
+--------------------------+
(3.e) The Document Shepherd then communicates the DISCUSS and
COMMENT items to the document editors and the working group,
alerting them of any changes to the document that have
accumulated during IESG processing, such as "Notes to the RFC
Editor". If any changes will be substantive, the Document
Shepherd, in consultation with the Responsible Area Director,
as during other stages, MUST confirm working group consensus
or sometimes even IETF consensus.
(3.f) After the editors resolve the DISCUSS and COMMENT items, the
Document Shepherd reviews the resulting new version of the
document, which will be a revised document, a set of "Notes to
the RFC Editor", or both, using his or her technical expertise
to ensure that all raised DISCUSS and COMMENT issues have been
resolved.
Note that the Document Shepherd MAY also suggest resolutions
to DISCUSS and COMMENT items, enter them into an issue
tracker, or perform other steps to streamline the resolution
of the evaluation comments. It is very important to resolve
the comments in a timely way, while the discussion is current
for everyone involved.
(3.g) When the Document Shepherd is satisfied that the revised
document addresses the evaluation comments, he or she
communicates the resolution to the Responsible Area Director
and the ADs that had raised the DISCUSS and COMMENT items.
(3.h) Each AD who had raised a DISCUSS checks whether the
communicated resolution addresses his or her items. If it
does, the AD will clear the DISCUSS. If it does not, the AD
notifies the Document Shepherd and adds information to the ID
Tracker explaining why the DISCUSS was not resolved. The
Document Shepherd informs the working group accordingly.
(COMMENT items need not be checked and cleared, because they
do not block the document, but ADs are encouraged to do so.)
If a DISCUSS was not resolved to the satisfaction of the AD
that has raised it or the Responsible Area Director, two
possibilities exist:
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(a) The process returns to step (3.d), or
(b) If no progress can be made on the resolution of the
DISCUSS with the AD who has raised it, despite repeated
clarifications and discussions, the Responsible Area
Director should take over continued shepherding of the
document. Such a situation may be indicative of larger
issues that the PROTO process was not designed to handle.
Once the process above has cleared all DISCUSS items, document
shepherding continues with step (3.i).
(3.i) The Responsible Area Director moves the document to the
"Approved - Announcement to be sent" state in the ID Tracker.
If he or she deems the changes to the revised document
significant, there may be a new WG Last Call, or possibly a
new IETF Last Call. The document goes through a new full IESG
Evaluation process if there is a new IETF Last Call.
4. Shepherding the Document's IANA Actions
IETF working group documents often include considerations requiring
actions by the IANA, such as creating a new registry or adding
information to an existing registry, perhaps after consulting an
IESG-appointed Expert. Sometimes the Document Shepherd must keep
track of certain IANA actions to be completed by the IESG, such as
ratifying the appointment of a designated Expert called for in the
IANA Considerations. IANA-related processing may also include a
specified type of Expert review, such as review of proposed MIME
media types on the designated ietf-types mailing list.
The IANA reviews IETF documents and requests responses at any or all
of the following times: in response to IETF Last Call, during the
IESG Evaluation review of the document, and at the time when the IANA
performs actions in its web-based registry for the document, usually
but not always after IESG approval of the document. More details of
the IANA process and IETF interaction are found in [RFC 2434].
At the time of this publication, RFC 2434 is under revision
[RFC2434bis], and the updates are and will be of value to the
Document Shepherd. Note that the Document Shepherd MUST determine
(by individual review and consultation with others) what is the most
recent and the most applicable IANA information and guidance for his
or her document, be it the overall guidance, or external documents in
his or her area, or in other areas. An example of an external
document is [RFC 4020].
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Whenever an IANA request comes, during whatever phase of the
shepherding process, the requester from IANA MUST ensure that the
Document Shepherd and the Responsible Area Director both receive the
request. The Document Shepherd is responsible for responding as
rapidly as possible. He or she should discuss requests that
introduce any possible concerns with the working group. The Document
Shepherd and the Responsible Area Director may decide in consultation
that an IANA request leads to a change that needs additional review
or approval.
In general, the Document Shepherd ensures that the IANA process
completes, checks that the registry is correct and that the IANA
Matrix (http://www.iana.org/numbers.html) is complete and consistent,
and troubleshoots when all is not well. At the end of IANA
processing, the Document Shepherd should be sure that the RFC Editor
has acknowledged IANA conclusion, i.e., that the handoff has been
made.
In summary, the task of shepherding the IANA actions is often
overlooked, but is as important to coordinate and manage as all the
other document reviews the Document Shepherd has managed. As with
those, the Document Shepherd contributes greatly to quality and
timeliness of the document by effective and responsive shepherding of
the IANA requests.
5. Document Shepherding after IESG Approval
After the IESG Evaluation and resolution described in Section 3.3,
the IESG approves the document, and the Responsible Area Director
uses the ID Tracker to ask for any final changes to the Document
Announcement Write-Up and for it to be issued. The Document Shepherd
may have some edits for the Responsible Area Director, such as minor
"Notes to the RFC Editor", and this is the time to consult and
provide them.
The IESG approval announcement goes to the general community and to
the RFC Editor, and now the Document Shepherd (identified in the
Announcement Write-Up) continues to shepherd the document through its
technical publication. The RFC Editor currently makes a number of
types of requests to the authors, Document Shepherd and Responsible
Area Director. The Document Shepherd SHOULD lead in responding to
the RFC Editor and shepherd the document during the post-approval
period to its publication.
The RFC Editor request types include: editorial queries about
dangling or missing informative and normative citations (good
shepherding should try to catch these earlier, but they happen);
requests for the document source (e.g., XML or nroff); occasional
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technical comments; and copy-edits for review and close scrutiny by
the authors (AUTH48). For the latter, the Document Shepherd SHOULD
lead in checking that copy-edits have in no case affected a consensus
wording of the working group that prepared the document, and SHOULD
bring speed to this checking by multiple coauthors. The Document
Shepherd also consults with the Responsible Area Director on
reviewing proposed post-approval changes to the document by any
author. These may require Area Director approval, and they often
need to be presented to the working group for consent if not a full
consensus procedure.
As in other phases of document shepherding, the Document Shepherd
provides attentiveness and timeliness by serving as the informed
representative of the document and helping its advancement and its
integrity.
6. When Not to Use the Document Shepherding Process
As mentioned in Section 3, the Document Shepherd SHOULD NOT be an
editor of the shepherded document. If this cannot be avoided by
making another working group chair or secretary the Document
Shepherd, the document shepherding process SHOULD NOT be used. There
are several other cases in which the document shepherding process
SHOULD NOT be used. These include:
1. Cases where the Document Shepherd is the primary author or editor
of a large percentage of the documents produced by the working
group.
2. Cases where the Responsible Area Director expects communication
difficulties with the Document Shepherd (either due to
experience, strong views stated by the Document Shepherd, or
other issues).
3. Cases where the working group itself is either very old, losing
energy, or winding down (i.e., cases where it would not be
productive to initiate new processes or procedures).
Finally, note that other cases exist in which using the document
shepherding process may not be productive. The final determination
as to whether or not to use the document shepherding process is left
to the Responsible Area Director. If the document shepherding
process is not used, the Responsible Area Director acts as Document
Shepherd, per the existing procedures of shepherding by Area
Directors.
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RFC 4858 Document Shepherding to Publication May 2007
7. Security Considerations
This document specifies a change to IETF document-processing
procedures. As such, it neither raises nor considers protocol-
specific security issues.
8. IANA Considerations
This document creates no new requirements on IANA namespaces or other
IANA requirements.
9. Acknowledgments
This document is the product of the PROTO team, which includes the
authors as well as Bill Fenner, Barbara Fuller, and Margaret
Wasserman. Aaron Falk worked actively in PROTO until the start of
2006 and worked on earlier versions of the document.
The Document Shepherd Write-Up originated in an idea by John Klensin.
Thomas Narten and Margaret Wasserman implemented it for the entire
Internet Area, and their template was the basis of the version used
today.
Colin Perkins wrote the original Document Announcement Write-Up for
draft-ietf-avt-rtp-midi-format included in Appendix A.1. David Black
wrote the original Document Announcement Write-Up for
draft-ietf-imss-ip-over-fibre-channel included in Appendix A.2. Both
original announcements have been modified to reflect changes to the
Document Announcement Write-Up template since they were written.
Frank Ellermann and Olafur Gudmundsson have suggested improvements to
the document during IETF Last Call.
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RFC 4858 Document Shepherding to Publication May 2007
10. References
10.1. Normative References
[RFC 2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
10.2. Informative References
[RFC 4020] Kompella, K. and A. Zinin, "Early IANA Allocation of
Standards Track Code Points", BCP 100, RFC 4020,
February 2005.
[RFC 2434] Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, "Guidelines for Writing
an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs", BCP 26,
RFC 2434, October 1998.
[RFC 3967] Bush, R. and T. Narten, "Clarifying when Standards
Track Documents may Refer Normatively to Documents at a
Lower Level", BCP 97, RFC 3967, December 2004.
[RFC2434bis] Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, "Guidelines for Writing
an IANA Considerations Section in RFCs", Work in
Progress, March 2007.
[IDTRACKER] "The IETF Internet-Draft Tracker", Web
Application: https://datatracker.ietf.org/, 2002.
[PROTO] "The IESG PROcess and TOols (PROTO) Team", Web
Page: http://psg.com/~mrw/PROTO-Team, 2004.
[GEN-ART] "The General Area Review Team (GEN-ART)", Web Page:
http://www.alvestrand.no/ietf/gen/
review-guidelines.html, 2005.
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Appendix A. Example Document Announcement Write-Ups
This appendix includes two examples of Document Announcement Write-
Ups. Many more examples with Subject lines such as "Protocol Action"
and "Document Action" can be found in the IETF-announce mailing list
archive.
A.1. Example Document Announcement Write-Up for
draft-ietf-avt-rtp-midi-format
Technical Summary
These documents define the RTP Payload format for MIDI (Musical
Instrument Digital Interface), and additional guidelines on
implementation specifically concerning the timing of reception and
transmission for best performance in different applications. MIDI
is a real-time media, which however is brittle to losses and
errors. Therefore the RTP payload format defines recovery
journals as a way of avoiding persistent audible errors, and
discusses congestion control handling for these journals.
The RTP payload for MIDI encodes the broad range of MIDI commands.
The format is suitable for interactive applications (such as
network musical performance) and content-delivery (such as file
streaming).
Working Group Summary
There is consensus in the WG to publish these documents.
Document Quality
This RTP Payload format has been implemented during the
development of the specification and successfully tested over an
IP network between two remote sites, thus showing that the
technical solution is successfully working. It has been reviewed
by the MIDI Manufacturers Association and their comments have been
addressed.
Personnel
Magnus Westerlund and Colin Perkins jointly shepherded this
document. Allison Mankin reviewed the document for the IESG,
including a careful review with the editor of the media types, in
parallel with ietf-types list review requested on 2006-01-08,
which raised no issues.
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A.2. Example Document Announcement Write-Up for
draft-ietf-imss-ip-over-fibre-channel
Technical Summary
This document specifies the encapsulation of IPv6, IPv4 and ARP
packets over Fibre Channel. This document also specifies the
methods for forming IPv6 link-local addresses and statelessly
autoconfigured IPv6 addresses on Fibre Channel networks, and a
mechanism to perform IPv4 address resolution over Fibre Channel
networks. This document (when published as RFC) obsoletes RFC 2625
and RFC 3831.
Working Group Summary
This document has been reviewed by Fibre Channel experts in
Technical Committee T11 (Fibre Channel standards organization) in
addition to members of the IMSS WG. There is solid support for
this document both in the WG and from T11.
Document Quality
This document replaces and consolidates two separate RFCs on IPv4
over Fibre Channel (RFC 2625) and IPv6 over Fibre Channel (RFC
3831). Most of its technical content is unchanged from those
RFCs. The technical changes that have been made are primarily
based on implementation experience.
Personnel
The protocol has been reviewed for the IESG by David L. Black (WG
chair). Bert Wijnen has reviewed this document for the IESG. In
addition, Brian Haberman has done a review for the INT Area as
requested by WG-chair (David Black) via Margaret Wasserman.
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Authors' Addresses
Henrik Levkowetz
Torsgatan 71
Stockholm S-113 37
Sweden
Phone: +46 708 32 16 08
EMail: henrik@levkowetz.com
David Meyer
1225 Kincaid St
Eugene, OR 97403
USA
Phone: +1 541 346 1747
EMail: dmm@1-4-5.net
Lars Eggert
Nokia Research Center
P.O. Box 407
Nokia Group 00045
Finland
Phone: +49 50 48 24461
EMail: lars.eggert@nokia.com
URI: http://research.nokia.com/people/lars_eggert
Allison Mankin
Phone: +1-301-728-7199
EMail: mankin@psg.com
URI: http://www.psg.com/~mankin
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Full Copyright Statement
Copyright © The IETF Trust (2007).
This document is subject to the rights, licenses and restrictions
contained in BCP 78, and except as set forth therein, the authors
retain all their rights.
This document and the information contained herein are provided on an
"AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS
OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND
THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS
OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF
THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED
WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
Intellectual Property
The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any
Intellectual Property Rights or other rights that might be claimed to
pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in
this document or the extent to which any license under such rights
might or might not be available; nor does it represent that it has
made any independent effort to identify any such rights. Information
on the procedures with respect to rights in RFC documents can be
found in BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Copies of IPR disclosures made to the IETF Secretariat and any
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attempt made to obtain a general license or permission for the use of
such proprietary rights by implementers or users of this
specification can be obtained from the IETF on-line IPR repository at
http://www.ietf.org/ipr.
The IETF invites any interested party to bring to its attention any
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Acknowledgement
Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the
Internet Society.
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RFC TOTAL SIZE: 48572 bytes
PUBLICATION DATE: Wednesday, May 2nd, 2007
LEGAL RIGHTS: The IETF Trust (see BCP 78)
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