Re: Retrospect on PAC review item 1.1

[bosak@ort.Eng.Sun.COM (Jon Bosak)]

[robin@isogen.com:]

| I. ISO [e.g., New Work Item]

[...]

| Description: "Any known relevant documents (such
| as standards and regulations) shall be listed,
| regardless of their source. It would generally be
| helpful if the list of documents could be accompanied
| by an indication of their significance. When the
| proposer considers that an existing well-established
| document may be acceptable as a standard (with or
| without amendments) this shall be indicated with
| appropriate justification and a copy attached to
| the proposal."
| 
| Comment: Note that the designers found wording which
| avoided the (putative) epistemological crisis --
| by using the word "known."  I have no idea whether
| an NP which left this content null would be accepted,
| but I assume so: if nothing is "known" and or
| "relevant," then nothing is known/relevant: blank.

"Known" does not solve the epistemological crisis, it just hides
from it behind the passive voice.  By whom is this information
known? By the authors of the proposal? By colleagues of the
authors of the proposal?  By distant acquaintances of the authors
of the proposal?  By the legal departments of the employers of the
authors of the proposal?  And how shall conformance with such a
stricture be determined?

"What did he know and when did he know it" is a hard, hard
question to answer provably.  I cannot consider a criterion
normative (regardless of what the ISO, NISO, JCP, or other experts
may think) if I am not given a method for establishing whether it
succeeds or fails to be satisfied in particular cases.  I
challenge you to exhibit a reliable method whereby any proposer of
a TC can later be judged to have known or not to have known about
the existence of other "relevant" efforts.  If there is no such
method, then this cannot be a normative criterion.

| I see several advantages to using the labeled section (which may
| be left blank).  Whether it's left blank or filled in, the
| readership can make a judgment about the proposal and the
| proposers: did they do their homework?  are they trying to hide
| something? Should I send them email alerting/reminding them that
| similar design/specification work is underway in XXXXX group?

The readership may (and in fact probably will) make such
judgements, but I assert that in the general case such judgements
will not be logically justified.  (Indeed, "did they do their
homework" and "are they trying to hide something" are excellent
examples of alternative interpretations that cannot be resolved
given only a blank as evidence.)

| NISO
| 
| Proposals have a notion of "Closely related standards
| activities"
| 
| Description: "Closely related standards activities:
| identify any existing NISO standards, international
| standards, and standards developed by other groups
| in the U.S. that are related or would be affected
| by the proposed project. Would it be beneficial to
| have a coordinating liaison with other professional
| organizations or groups during the development of
| the standard?"
| http://www.niso.org/pdfs/OpProc.pdf
| 
| Comment: NISO members apparently don't regard this
| language as oppressive, despite the omission of
| a qualifier, no doubt understood, "...as far as may
| be known to the proposers."

Of course they don't find this requirement oppressive.  Under your
interpretation, it doesn't require them to do anything.

| III.  JCP [Java Community Process]
| 
| [...]
| 
| Document skeleton:
| 
| "Section 3: Contributions
|    3.1 Please list any existing documents, specifications,
|        or implementations that describe the
|        technology. Please include links to the documents
|        if they are publicly available.
|    3.2 Explanation of how these items might be used
|        as a starting point for the work."

This is not phrased as a requirement but rather as a request.  We
decided that we do want to make such requests, but that the place
to make them is in some kind of guidelines document.  The language
governing formal procedures is not the place for recommendations.

| Comment: This language may not capture in ideal terms
| the notion of "related work," but in practice, the
| authors of JSRs seem to get the idea.  I don't know
| whether the proposers are required to say something other
| than "Nothing known at this time".  The point of the
| document subsection, in my thinking, is precisely to
| force the submitters to say what they think is relevant.
| No matter what they say (including nothing), it may be
| very relevant to the public and the grounds for
| understanding/evaluating the proposal.

You appear to rely more upon the evidentiary strength of silence
than I do.

Jon