RE: [soa-rm-ra] Review of Section 3.1.4 Policies and Contracts

[Peter F Brown <peter@peterfbrown.com>]

Danny,
Many thanks for these - I've not had time this evening to go through and incorporate the changes in the 'interim draft' I'm about to send out but they are duly noted!

Cheers,
Peter

| -----Original Message-----
| From: Danny Thornton [mailto:danny_thornton2@yahoo.com]
| Sent: Monday, 10 January 2011 21:53
| To: soa-rm-ra@lists.oasis-open.org
| Subject: [soa-rm-ra] Review of Section 3.1.4 Policies and Contracts
| 
| Editors' Draft 2010-12-21 (Main Changes tracked).pdf
| 
| Line 913
| A commitment is a type of constraint, redundant to add "commitment and/or".
| 
| Line 914
| "and stakeholder alone" is redundant.
| 
| Line 917
| A constraint may be measured and enforced by SOA mechanisms, the
| qualification of "but will usually be performed by a stakeholder in the ecosystem
| (public authority, legal system, etc.)" is too constraining.
| 
| Line 919 – 920
| Commitment is closely related to obligation.  A policy represents an obligation
| but does not represent a commitment.  We are governed by many policies we
| are not committed to.  A contract is a representation of a commitment.
| Commitment is a tighter qualification of obligation and does not fit the general
| level of section 3.1.4.
| 
| Line 923
| Figure 7 response to comment - Constraint was qualified with Policy because
| Constraint by itself was too general.  Policy Constraint does not inherit from
| Contract and Policy, UML diamond symbols are aggregations and triangles are
| inheritance.
| 
| Line 924
| The original definition of Policy is accurate.
| “A policy is an assertion promulgated by a stakeholder in such a way as to
| enforce  the assertion’s proposition.”
| In the modified definition, there is a temporal dependency between “commits”
| and then “if possible and necessary” .  While this may be true it is intuitively
| contradictory.
| “enforce through stated constraints” would just be “enforce stated constraints.”
| Promulgated or “to put into effect as a regulation” captures the actions of the
| stakeholder more accurately.
| 
| Line 931
| The “object of the policy” can be the stakeholder.  “or of the behavior of the
| stakeholders of the policy” is a qualified redundancy.
| 
| Lines 932 – 948
| Agree with removal of Policy Topic and Policy Object but add back the following
| definitions:
| 
| Policy Constraint
| A policy constraint is a measurable proposition that characterizes the constraint
| that the policy is about.
| 
| Contract
| A contract represents an agreement by two or more participants to constrain
| their behavior and/or state.
| 
| Prefer the shorter definition for Contract.
| 
| Line 948
| The use of “imply a desire to see constraints respected” opens another can of
| worms.  Would remove the sentence “Both policies and contracts imply …”
| 
| Line 951 to 956
| Agree with these additions.
| 
| Line 962
| Agree with addition but would put a period after “action” and drop “whereas”.
| 
| Line 970
| “based on the terms of the contract” is redundant.
| 
| Lines 971 – 977
| Agree with changes.
| 
| 
| Danny
| 
| 
| 
| 
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