RFC 5111

Experiment in Exploratory Group Formation within the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)

📅 published January 2008, from ietf

RFC 5111: Experiment in Exploratory Group Formation within the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) 🎀

Network Working Group, Category: Experimental 💜, January 2008 📅

Written by B. Aboba (Microsoft Corporation) and L. Dondeti (QUALCOMM, Inc.) 🫶. The title block doesn't list anything this one obsoletes or updates.

Status of This Memo 📜

Okay bestie, so this memo defines an Experimental Protocol for the Internet community 🧪. It is not an Internet standard of any kind 🙅‍♀️. The authors want your discussion and suggestions for improvement ✨. Distribution of this memo is unlimited 🌈.

Abstract 🍓

This document describes an RFC 3933 experiment in the Working Group formation process, known as the Exploratory Group 🔍. Exploratory Groups may be created as the first step toward Working Group formation, or as an intermediate step between a Birds of a Feather (BOF) session and Working Group creation 🦋. They're focused on finishing the prerequisites for Working Group formation, so they have a short life-time, with limited opportunities for milestone extension ⏳. Literally no time to dawdle 💅.

Table of Contents 🗂️

   1. Introduction ....................................................2
      1.1. Requirements ...............................................4
   2. Exploratory Group Formation .....................................4
   3. The Experiment ..................................................5
      3.1. Success Metrics ............................................5
   4. Security Considerations .........................................6
   5. Normative References ............................................6
   6. Acknowledgments .................................................6

1. Introduction ✨

Okay, so "IETF Working Group Guidelines and Procedures" [RFC2418] is the doc that describes how Working Groups get formed inside the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) 📚. As RFC 2418 [RFC2418] Section 2.1 notes, here's what the Area Directors and the IESG look at when deciding whether a working group should exist 👀:

      When determining whether it is appropriate to create a working
      group, the Area Director(s) and the IESG will consider several
      issues:

      - Are the issues that the working group plans to address clear and
        relevant to the Internet community?

      - Are the goals specific and reasonably achievable, and achievable
        within a reasonable time frame?

      - What are the risks and urgency of the work, to determine the
        level of effort required?

      - Do the working group's activities overlap with those of another
        working group?
        ...

      - Is there sufficient interest within the IETF in the working
        group's topic with enough people willing to expend the effort to
        produce the desired result (e.g., a protocol specification)?
        ...

      - Is there enough expertise within the IETF in the working group's
        topic, and are those people interested in contributing in the
        working group?
        ...

      - Does a base of interested consumers (end-users) appear to exist
        for the planned work?
        ...

      - Does the IETF have a reasonable role to play in the
        determination of the technology?
        ...

      - Are all known intellectual property rights relevant to the
        proposed working group's efforts issues understood?

      - Is the proposed work plan an open IETF effort or is it an
        attempt to "bless" non-IETF technology where the effect of input
        from IETF participants may be limited?

      - Is there a good understanding of any existing work that is
        relevant to the topics that the proposed working group is to
        pursue?  This includes work within the IETF and elsewhere.

      - Do the working group's goals overlap with known work in another
        standards body, and if so is adequate liaison in place?

Sometimes the IETF folks are super into a topic, and the Internet community clearly cares, but the other questions 🤔 (like whether anyone understands the existing work, whether the goals are clear and doable, or whether it overlaps with another group or standards body) aren't sorted yet 😬. In the past, the usual move was to hold off on forming the WG, or even holding BOF sessions, until those answers showed up 🕰️. The problem is that the status of the potential WG can stay officially undetermined for months or even years 😭. Area Directors are supposed to give potential WG participants timely updates and insight into IESG or IAB concerns, but there's currently no mechanism to track progress toward WG creation 📉. So participants may not know the status or the next steps, and missing formal recognition can hurt motivation. People who haven't followed closely might even think nothing is happening 🥺.

This document describes an RFC 3933 [RFC3933] experiment in the Working Group (WG) formation process, known as the Exploratory Group (EG) 🧚. Exploratory Group milestones are focused on finishing the prerequisites for WG formation, so they're expected to wrap up within a short time frame, with limited opportunities for milestone extension 🏁.

This experiment doesn't change the WG formation guidelines in RFC 2418 [RFC2418] Section 2.1, or the Internet Standards Process in RFC 2026 [RFC2026] 🙌. It builds on those existing processes and adds a bit of formality, which can help clarify IESG and/or IAB concerns about WG formation criteria and push for faster progress on resolving them 🚀. Exploratory Group documents (including the EG Charter and potential WG Charter) get reviewed and comments are tracked with the existing tools and processes, so feedback reaches EG chairs and authors. That means transparency and accountability, which is giving very good governance energy 💅✨.

1.1. Requirements 📝

The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119] 🎀.

2. Exploratory Group Formation 🦋

If, at any point during the Working Group formation process, relevance to the Internet community and interest within the IETF and end-user community have been demonstrated, but one or more WG formation criteria outlined in RFC 2418 [RFC2418] Section 2.1 still haven't been met, the IESG MAY propose that an Exploratory Group be formed 💌. Exploratory Groups MAY be created as the first step toward WG formation, or as an intermediate step between an initial Birds of a Feather (BOF) session and WG creation 🌸. Forming an Exploratory Group after a second BOF is NOT RECOMMENDED 🙅‍♀️.

Since the whole point of an Exploratory Group is to get the prerequisites for WG formation in place faster than would otherwise be possible ⚡, Exploratory Groups SHOULD initially be chartered for a period of six months to twelve months, with six months being the default ⏰. The IESG MAY extend the initial Exploratory Group milestones by an additional six months, but extensions beyond this are NOT RECOMMENDED 🚫. The Exploratory Group Charter SHOULD include at least the following "basic milestones" 🎯:

Development of a Working Group Charter.
Development of a document demonstrating fulfillment of the Working Group formation criteria described in RFC 2418 [RFC2418] Section 2.1.

The IESG MAY also include additional milestones within an Exploratory Group charter (such as development of a problem statement or requirements document and/or completion of a review of the literature or current practices) 📚, as long as those additional milestones don't compromise the ability of the Exploratory Group to deliver on the basic milestones in a timely way ⏱️. An Exploratory Group charter MUST NOT include milestones relating to development of standards track documents or protocol specifications 🛑. Not on my watch 💅.

Since the Exploratory Group experiment isn't meant to replace the existing WG formation process 🙈, Exploratory Groups SHOULD be formed only in situations where the prerequisites for WG formation are likely to be met if the EG successfully completes the basic milestones 🫶.

3. The Experiment 🧪

This experiment runs for 18 months from IESG approval of the experiment ⌛. During that period, the IESG MAY approve the formation of as many as three Exploratory Groups 🌈. The IESG MUST inform the community, in a public statement, of any decisions for Exploratory Group formation approved under this experiment 📢. Such a statement SHOULD include a description of the specific Exploratory Group that was formed 📝.

Since this is an experiment, the goal is for Exploratory Groups to be handled exactly like Working Groups in terms of IETF process, tools and infrastructure, and no additional burden is supposed to land on the IETF Secretariat 🧚‍♀️. Apart from the abbreviated Exploratory Group charter, forming one works the same as forming a WG, including review by the IAB and IESG, announcing the potential Exploratory Group, and asking the IETF community for review 📣. An Exploratory Group's operating rules (openness, meeting requirements, etc.) are identical to Working Groups 🤝. From the IETF infrastructure side (tools, membership in the WGCHAIRS mailing list, process rules, Exploratory Group Charter pages, etc.), Exploratory Groups are treated identically to Working Groups, with one exception: Exploratory Group names should include "EG" within the name (e.g. "EXAMPLEEG") so they're clearly different from Working Groups 🏷️✨.

Reviews of Exploratory Group documents use the same tracking tools and processes (including PROTO shepherding) as other IETF documents 🔎. That lets EG chairs and participants see the feedback and gives extra clarity on next steps 💖. Forming an Exploratory Group requires appointing an Exploratory Group Chair, plus a well defined set of WG formation criteria (agreement on the Working Group Charter, review of the formation criteria, a problem statement or requirements document, etc.) 👑.

3.1. Success Metrics ✨

okay so the whole point of this experiment is to get Working Groups formed faster 🚀, which means we can judge each Exploratory Group (and the experiment overall) by how much progress it makes toward becoming a Working Group. Here are the metrics that matter 💅

Progress on Basic Milestones 🎯 An Exploratory Group that doesn't hit its basic milestones can't be called successful, no matter what else it has going on, like a lovely literature review or requirements document 📚 It's giving "you can't skip the basics bestie." Progress here is measured by two things: whether the milestones get done within the timeframe in the initial Exploratory Group Charter, and whether the IESG, IAB, and wider IETF community respond positively enough that the IESG votes to form a Working Group 🙌

Mailing List Activity 💬 One of the goals of the Exploratory Group experiment is to stop participants from losing interest 😭 So steady engagement from the people in the group, showing up on the mailing list, counts as a potential success metric 📬 On the flip side, an Exploratory Group whose mailing list is basically dead would probably not be a good candidate for a milestone extension 💀

4. Security Considerations 🔐

Okay, real talk: this document describes an experiment in forming Exploratory Groups, and it has no security considerations 🫶

5. Normative References 📖

Here are the references this document leans on, with all the details:

[RFC2026] Bradner, S., "The Internet Standards Process -- Revision 3", BCP 9, RFC 2026, October 1996.
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC2418] Bradner, S., "IETF Working Group Guidelines and Procedures", BCP 25, RFC 2418, September 1998.
[RFC3933] Klensin, J. and S. Dawkins, "A Model for IETF Process Experiments", BCP 93, RFC 3933, November 2004.

6. Acknowledgments 🫶

The authors want to give a huge shoutout to Jari Arkko, Brian Carpenter, Thomas Narten, Lars Eggert, Eric Rescorla, Sam Hartman, and John Klensin for their valuable input 💖 iykyk, they're the real MVPs 👑

Authors' Addresses 📬

Bernard Aboba
Microsoft Corporation
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052

EMail: bernarda@microsoft.com
Phone: +1 425 706 6605
Fax:   +1 425 936 7329


Lakshminath Dondeti
QUALCOMM, Inc.
5775 Morehouse Dr
San Diego, CA
USA

EMail: ldondeti@qualcomm.com
Phone: +1 858-845-1267

Here's the legal stuff, kept exactly as written 🎀

This document is subject to the rights, licenses and restrictions contained in BCP 78, and except as set forth therein, the authors retain all their rights.

This document and the information contained herein are provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

Intellectual Property 🦋

More legal boilerplate, also kept verbatim 🙈

The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any Intellectual Property Rights or other rights that might be claimed to pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in this document or the extent to which any license under such rights might or might not be available; nor does it represent that it has made any independent effort to identify any such rights. Information on the procedures with respect to rights in RFC documents can be found in BCP 78 and BCP 79.

Copies of IPR disclosures made to the IETF Secretariat and any assurances of licenses to be made available, or the result of an attempt made to obtain a general license or permission for the use of such proprietary rights by implementers or users of this specification can be obtained from the IETF on-line IPR repository at http://www.ietf.org/ipr.

The IETF invites any interested party to bring to its attention any copyrights, patents or patent applications, or other proprietary rights that may cover technology that may be required to implement this standard. Please address the information to the IETF at ietf-ipr@ietf.org. ✨

📦 where this page comes from

ietf: rfc5111 2008-01
💖 girlified by claude-haiku-5-5 on 2026-10-17: a language model's rewrite of the original, under its terms