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In reply to Offer Pazy's note attached, let me
express my point of view, which includes a belief that we must define our
requirements in a systematic fashion:
Based on almost two decades of deep involvement in
standards creation, it is my strong belief that an early discussion that
attempts to lock down what requirements are will produce a huge amount of
discussion, but few answers. It is also likely to help polarize positions,
making it more difficult to develop resolution later on. Frankly, I am concerned that it is too early to decide on any
but the very highest level objectives at the January interim meeting. In
addition, we do have other very high priority tasks in front of us, including
the agreement on how we will move this standards development process
forward.
Certainly, we can include a discussion of high
level objectives at the January meeting. If there is time, we can begin to
drill down to see if there are areas where we have concensus. I would be
adverse to any lenghy discussions to defend positions at this meeting.
Rather, I would prefer to note where there are multiple opinions, and document
the different directions we may decide to take, so we can solicit email
discussion and papers at future meetings to help resolve the issues.
Offer, I understand that it can be frustrating to
focus on process when there are real problems out there that need to be solved,
and decisions that must be made. In addition, we must not spend too much
time organizing, thereby losing time precious development time. I propose
that taking next weeks meeting to define the playing field, and the rules, and
to understand where the issues are, rather than attempting to resolve them will
prepare us to move quickly on resolving issues from that point on.
Best regards,
Robert D. Love President, LAN Connect Consultants 7105 Leveret
Circle Raleigh, NC 27615 Phone: 919
848-6773 Mobile: 919 810-7816 email: rdlove@xxxxxxxx
Fax: 720 222-0900
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, January 06, 2001 12:40
PM
Subject: RE: Jan 15-17 meeting. I'm
confused, please help
Mike
and others,
After reading the exchange below and Mike's tentative agenda, I'm a bit
uncertain as to what exactly we want to achieve in the upcoming meeting. It is
clear to me that significant portion of the time will (and has to) be
dedicated to bringing everybody new on board. We have only two days and the
question is how to we make sure that the rest of the time is used
productively.
Let
me explain what I'm mostly interested in and what I believe should be the
first priority of the meeting: Requirements, Requirements, Requirements. I've
been spending a lot of time in the past two months explaining to people what
RPR is about. But beyond "dual-counter rotating rings", I could not say
anything else in any confidence. Most people understand the issues and ask
questions regarding specific capabilities. All I have now (and I believe this
is all we have) is an unflushed and unsorted list of very high-level "things"
that I've copied from some presentations and from the white board and it is
not enough.
It
is clear to me that the interim meeting does not make decisions and that
nailing down specific requirements may take a long time, but at least I would
like us to move in that direction.
If
possible, my goal for the meeting would be to come up with a requirements list
that is as specific as to be clearly understood by everyone leaving as little
as possible for ambiguity or "between the lines" meaning. I expect that some
issues will be controversial and I don't expect we resolve this at the
meeting. Nevertheless having such concise and clear list will help us all
focus and understand where we agree and where we don't. We can establish a
convention on how to mark such issues.
Just
as an illustration (I do not wish to start a debate on
these):
Fairness: Is the intention fairness within a node or within the
ring?
Congestion management/control: Is it management or control? Is it CAC
based (probably not)? Do we assume buffers or not?
Again, these are just examples. Another outcome of such an effort will
be to have one list of requirements instead of several (there are some
differences between the various presentations and the list we've
prepared to the 802.3).
What
do people think? Is it the right time and important enough to focus on this in
the upcoming meeting?
Offer Pazy
Sr. Product Manager
Native Networks
15 Gonen St.
Petah Tikva 49170
Israel
The
Native Way = Ethernet Simplicity + SONET Reliability
Rob,
Thanks. I was trying to get the logistics. Here is
what I read from your comments
For us to complete the standard there are many
sections and sub sections to be written.
Before that can be done there are many proposal to
evaluate.
Before that can be done there are the objectives
and scope.
I
propose a framework and then identify the scope and
objectives....
Network
single
Ring
Interconnected
Rings
Bridges and
router
MAC Layer
Data path
function
forwarding
filtering
error
correction/detection
Control
Plane
header
definition
network
size
header
field definition
customer separation
header
bit definition
L2 functions
Node
discovery
Fairness
L3
interface
L1 management
I/F
L1
control
L1
Interfaces
Generic Packet interface
SONET
SDH
Gigabit Ethernet
DWDM
Digital Wrapper
Network Applications
Ring
interconnect
Transparent LAN
Service
ISP
Harry, here is my 2¢ on this one: I would
expect us to continue to refine our detailed scope and objectives, going
much further than the PAR input. I anticipate that 802.17 will be
doing a significant amount of voting at the March plenary meeting, some of
which will be establishing things like objectives. Hopefully a great
deal of the work will have been done ahead of time, including at the
upcoming meeting, and via email discussion. All of this work should
fundamentally build on what the Study Group has previously decided, even
though the Study Group's output is not binding on the decisions of the
Working Group.
I don't know how much time will be available
at the January interim meeting to address the issue of refinement of the
Scope and Objectives. If there is time, I think the topic will fit
well with the meeting's overall focus.
Best regards,
Robert D. Love President, LAN Connect Consultants 7105 Leveret
Circle Raleigh, NC 27615 Phone: 919
848-6773 Mobile: 919
810-7816 email: rdlove@xxxxxxxx
Fax: 720 222-0900
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, January 02, 2001
11:40 AM
Subject: Q: Jan 15-17 meeting
mike:
Are you gathering scope an objectives to help
defining the tasks in the schedule to complete the standard?
Some of the scope were discussed in previous
meetings. Now that we are a WG are we recapturing and additional detail
scope
and objectives as confined in the PAR and 5
Criteria?
Regards,
Harry
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