NEW ISSUE: Intents are still not optional - even after resolution of Issue79

[David Booz <booz@us.ibm.com>]

TARGET: SCA Policy FW spec CD02-rev4 + Issue 79 resolution [1]

DESCRIPTION:

On Sept 21 [2] we accepted the resolution to ISSUE-79 as shown in the email [1] from Ashok. While working on the SCA Policy testcases and simultaneously applying newly resolved issues, I discovered a potential problem in the interpretation of the resolution. I'll get back to the relevance to the testcases at the end of this email.

Here's the relevant change we made to Section 11 Conformance, as part of issue 79 resolution:
Pre Issue-79 text:
The implementation does not have to support any intents listed in this specification, and MAY reject SCDL documents that contain them. If a specific intent is supported any relevant Conformance Items in Appendix C related to the intent and the SCA Runtime MUST be followed.

Issue 79 Resolution text:
SCA implementations MUST recognize the intents listed in Appendix B1 of this specification. The manner in which specific intents are processed must be in accord with any relevant Conformance Items in Appendix C related to the intent.and the SCA Runtime options selected.

My concern is over how to read the second sentence beginning with "The manner...". If you couple that with statements in Appendix C, I think you could end up in a situation where it appears that the runtime MUST support the intents that we've defined in the spec. Here's an example of an intent specific statement in Appendix C:

For a component marked with managedTransaction.global, the SCA runtime MUST ensure that a global transaction is present before dispatching any method on the component. [POL90003]

Since we did NOT intend to require SCA Policy runtimes (nor binding or implementation type runtimes) to implement the defined intents, I think we need to adjust the wording of the issue 79 resolution. I would like to alter the text provided by ISSUE-79 resolution as in the proposal below.

SIDE NOTE on Testing: What's the relevance to the testing effort? In the other TCs, we've not been writing testcases for optional aspects of the spec. If we can finally nail down intents as being optional, then I am going to propose that we not write tests for any of the specified intents (exception might be the SOAP intent). That is a separate discussion and will require a separate decision from the TC, but this is how it ties in with this new issue.

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PROPOSAL:

Original sentence from issue 79 resolution:
The manner in which specific intents are processed must be in accord with any relevant Conformance Items in Appendix C related to the intent.and the SCA Runtime options selected..

Proposed replacement:
An implementationType / bindingType / collection of policySets that claims to implement a specific intent must process that intent in accord with any relevant Conformance items in Appendix C related to the intent and the SCA Runtime options selected.


[1] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/sca-policy/200909/msg00011.html
[2] http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34434/SCA%20Policy%20minutes%202009-09-21.pdf


Dave Booz
STSM, BPM and SCA Architecture
Co-Chair OASIS SCA-Policy TC and SCA-J TC
"Distributed objects first, then world hunger"
Poughkeepsie, NY (845)-435-6093 or 8-295-6093
e-mail:booz@us.ibm.com