So what happens in a public review?

[robert_weir@us.ibm.com]

OK.  OK.  OK.  I messed that one up and sent this note to the 
office-comment list, instead of the office list.  I am slapping my own 
wrists for commenting on the public comment list.

-Rob


The last public review we had on this TC was January 2007 I believe, with 
the review of ODF 1.1.  So we have many TC members who have not been 
through the process before.  And we also have new tools, like JIRA, that 
we did not have in the last round.  So it is worth reviewing the 
requirements and how we might apply them in this case.

OASIS TC Process 3.2 covers the public review (
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/process.php#publicReview).

Highlights are:

1) All public (non TC member) comments must come through the 
office-comment list.   This preserves the IP pedigree of our work, since 
submissions via the comment list happen under the Feedback License (
http://www.oasis-open.org/who/ipr/feedback_license.pdf).  So if you hear a 

comment via email, or on Twitter or a blog or discussion forum elsewhere, 
please ask the author to submit the comment formally via the 
office-comment list.  Instructions are here: 
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/comments/index.php?wg_abbrev=office

2) Also note that according to TC Process 2.8, "The purpose of the TC?s 
public comment facility is to receive comments from the public and is not 
for public discussion" and "Comments to the TC made by Members of the TC 
must be made via the TC general email list, and comments made by non-TC 
members, including from the public, must be made via the TC?s comment 
facility. Comments shall not be accepted via any other means."  So 
comments on the public review draft from TC members are made via the usual 

means (TC's mailing list, bringing up in a meeting, or preferably entered 
directly into JIRA) and not via the comment list. 

When you enter the issue in JIRA, classify the component as "Packaging". 
We can then track the public review comments as those that were assigned 
packaging between November 13th and January 12th.

3) The TC must acknowledge the receipt of each public comment.  This 
occurs automatically, since we use an email reflector list.  Each person 
who submits a comment will immediately receive a copy of the comment back 
to them via email.  That is the acknowledgement. 

4) We need to track all comments received.  This will be done in JIRA. I 
have automation that will automatically transfer comments into JIRA from 
the office-comment list.  This works best when we observe the prohibition 
against discussion on the comment list.  Otherwise we will end up with 
extraneous comments in JIRA.

5) Sometime after the end of the review period (60 days) we need to 
publish the disposition of each comment.  Typically, we propose 
dispositions on the list, or directly in JIRA, and then vote to approve 
the dispositions in a meeting.  The dispositions are then published in the 

meeting minutes and that satisfies the requirement to publish 
dispositions.   However, if there are more than a handful of comments we 
could also just minute that the comments are disposed as per their 
resolutions in JIRA, and then give their OFFICE-X numbers.  Since all JIRA 

resolutions get echoed to the mailing list, this should meet the 
requirements as well.

6) We cannot make changes to the public review draft while the review is 
underway.  However, that does not prevent us from making changes in a new 
numbered revision of the standard to address public comments as they are 
received.  In fact this is a wise use of time.

7) We can have several cycles of public review to the extent we continue 
to make substantive changes to the text. 

We can discuss this more on Monday's call if anyone has questions, 
comments or concerns.

Regards,

-Rob