To the Court Filing Technical
Committee:
We owe a vote of thanks to Don Bergeron
for persisting in his work on the Policy Requirements document. He has
presented it to us on numerous occasions and has done what he could with the
limited input he has received. He accepted the assignment and discharged it
with little help from the rest of us.
I have worked on the document, first to
suggest changes I thought would make Don's exposition of requirements clearer,
for my sake and maybe others. Since Don's call for a vote last week, I have
worked through the document again, this time looking for ways to ensure it
would give us all the requirements that the Policy specification should later
be written to fulfill. Unfortunately, the latter effort hasn't worked.
I believe the Electronic Court Filing TC
needs to go back to the drawing board with the Policy specification, because
we, the TC members, failed to engage ourselves with the subject. We left it to
Don to develop this work product. He presented it in Utah in June and it has been available in written form for our
review and comments since. There has not been much feedback. I believe it is
because most of the members of the TC have not been paying attention. Perhaps
the feeling has been, "So long as it isn't yet a draft specification, it
doesn't matter if I don't pay close attention - someone will do that and, if
they do not, is much harm done?"
I noticed we didn't get to the agenda
item below on our last conference call. Because we didn't discuss and decide
anything about it, it appears the assertion it was "removed from
consideration" wasn't taken as final, and now we've been called to vote. (Per
our adopted Procedures - who has read them?? - the co-chairs are the ones who
are to announce review and approval periods and set the deadlines for comments
and votes.)
"11. Discussion of Court Policy --
as time permits. The draft requirements document has been removed from
consideration. Do we want to pursue a different approach in constructing a
revised requirements document?"
I vote not to approve the proposed
Requirements. I believe they are incomplete. Some of the sentences in the
document I simply could not understand for lack of specifics and definitions
and context. I do not feel it provides a complete statement of what the Policy
specification must address. I fear that if we adopt the Requirements for
Policy as written as our official statement, we will publish something that
shows how lightly we, as a TC, have treated their development.
I like to think about and share
alternatives, not just say I feel something hasn't worked out. Accordingly, I
propose the following:
Option #1. Table or cancel the Court
Policy Requirements document and all remaining work on specifications in the
"Court Filing 1.x family," leaving "Court Filing 1.1," "Court Document 1.1,"
and "Query and Response 1.0" as "proposed specifications" of the TC that are
written in DTD.
Further:
a) Although I do not know of any court or
vendor that expects to implement the original DTD-based architecture fully, as
we had envisioned a while ago, if there is such a project, the TC should offer
to work with the court or vendor involved to help them meet their needs while
the TC does what it needs to do.
b) The TC should now begin development of
the "2.x" specification(s) and, whether a single Schema or a family of
Schemas, divide the work into logical parts (e.g., Filing Transaction, Court
Form, Document, Query/Response, Policy/CDC <-These are not proposals.) and
assign groups (not individuals) to get to work on them. The first step, by our
procedures, would be for each group to draft the "Statement of Work," to
clarify what is to be done and get agreement of the whole TC on that, and then
to proceed to develop Requirements, followed by a draft "Candidate
Specification," and so forth.
c) As part of the development work, the
TC should seek out alternative architectural proposals from anyone willing to
offer them (vendors, OXCI, the California group?) so we can review them along with the one we have.
We could then rethink our basic ideas and move forward with a renewed, shared
vision, whatever it turns out to be. Whether we stick with what we have
developed before or not, I believe we need a reality check to make sure all of
us are in agreement as to goals, purposes, architecture, specifications
needed, etc.
HOWEVER,
Option #2. If we are to continue to
develop a Court Policy 1.x specification, I believe a newly reconstituted
authoring committee needs to be recruited to restart the process, this time,
according to our new procedures:
a) Develop a Statement of Work (What is
involved? How will the policy interface be used? Who is needed to do the
requirements and drafting work? etc.) and get the TC's approval to proceed
based on it.
b) Work out the Requirements anew, e.g.,
review it against Don's work, look at all of the "Functional/Technical
Requirements" adopted by the JTC of COSCA/NACM, and review it in light of all
of the elements and functions of the other specifications of the "1.x" family
of the Court Filing "family" of specifications, including those not yet
written.
c) Within the drafting committee, ensure
all requirements are well defined and explained for the lay person (since they
must be understood not only by the designer of the EFM and other systems but
by each court's experts in its policies and practices). That is what should go
to the TC for review and approval. Building on the work already done might
help keep this process from taking too long. The result would be an approved
statement of Requirements for Court Policy that would be a detailed guide to
help developers of the Court Policy specification know what they must address
and a clear exposition for courts on what matters and why.
d) Proceed then through the rest of the
specification development steps: draft the Court Policy candidate
specification, have it vetted on the List and at a Face-to-Face, incorporate
input and publish for vote, in which case the specification can become a
"Proposed Specification" of the TC. Based on experience from implementations
and criteria in the specification, it then could later be elevated to a
"Recommended Specification." (These are the procedures we adopted "without
dissent" a few weeks ago.)
I recommend we adopt Option #1., above.
If we adopt Option #2., instead, I propose we also get started on Option #1.
anyway.
For a long time I have been concerned
that I didn't understand many things being said and discussed at the TC,
because the "tech speak" behind it seemed so familiar to almost everyone else
in the room (evidenced by the head-nodding and lack of questions), so I kept
silent. I have come to believe that others have been silent too and that the
appearance of agreement, especially since "silence is approval," is actually
evidence of confusion, uncertainty, and deference to the most vocal others
because "they seem to know what they're talking about." It's time for all of
us to make sure that we all know what we are talking about and that we are,
indeed, actively in agreement.
Regards,
Roger
Roger
Winters
"They'll
forget it was late, but they'll never forget it was
wrong!"
Electronic Court Records
Manager
King County
Department of Judicial
Administration
516 Third Avenue,
E-609 MS: KCC-JA-0609
Seattle, Washington 98104
V: (206) 296-7838 F: (206)
296-0906
roger.winters@metrokc.gov