RE: [tag-discuss] Re: Draft Charter (Was: surviving the winter break)

["Durand, Jacques R." <JDurand@us.fujitsu.com>]

Inline

-jacques 

-----Original Message-----
From: david_marston@us.ibm.com [mailto:david_marston@us.ibm.com] 
Sent: Sunday, January 07, 2007 4:37 PM
To: tag-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: [tag-discuss] Re: Draft Charter (Was: surviving the winter
break)

I don't have any fatal objections, but I would like to see some
clarifications.

1. Are the deliverables intended to be an OASIS Standard? I notice that
the charter only says that they will be sent to the TAB for approval.

<JD> I think they should be at least committee specification. Should
they be pushed as an OASIS standard? I don't have a strong opinion on
this. In my mind, a guideline status is sufficient, but I could see an
XML mark-up becoming standard (although it might not be as consensual as
the guideline part...). Because of the nature of this work, I would not
rush to standardize and instead wait for many to use it first.

2. The part about the test harness ("...characterization of the test
environment or test harness assumed...") may be scary to some people. 
Could this be worded to say that "if necessary," some "minimal
assumptions" may be expressed?

<JD> agree we need to find a better way to convey the notion that its OK
for the TC to add some test harness considerations in a TA guide, since
in many cases at least, it is not possible to make entirely abstraction
of this when writing TAs. But it is really on the edge of the scope...

3. I think in pure form, the TAs won't require "refinement of the
definitions of concepts" from prior work, but describing the practical
usage of TAs should be integrated into the prior work and may indeed
require such refinement. In that light, the TAs are closely related to
test outcomes (pass, fail, precondition not met, etc.), and that concept
should get mentioned on the list of "external" concepts. Again, I think
this comes out in discussing practical usage rather than the theory of
TAs.

<JD> sounds right. If you have a better wording to convey this, all
right.

There may be a few other bits that make me slightly uncomfortable, but I
think they are subsumed under my assumption that the TC would act in
good faith under the proposed charter that makes clear that TAs are one
part of a larger effort.

<JD> the draft is open to rewording - the challenge is to try to outline
a scope that proves not too restrictive in the long term, yet gives
enough assurance that the TC will remain focused on the main topic.

.................David Marston

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