PEP TALK -- SPEAK UP!

[brender at gemevn dot zko dot dec dot com (Ron 603-884-2088)]

Last month following cancellation of our 9 December meeting, I asked Michael
why he had canceled the meeting when it seemed that we had at least two
topics that could usefully be discussed:

  - My 001130.1 alternative to 001101.1 regarding the multiple section
    problem for location lists and discontiguous scopes (recall that 001130.1
    resulted from the discussion of 001101.1 at the 28 November meeting).

  - The V3 vs "conditional V2" issue.

His reply concerning the first was basically that he'd seen no discussion of
it on the e-mail list and so had little reason to believe that it was ready
for formal meeting consideration.

His reply concerning the second was that there was in fact no formal proposal
yet on the table. There had been some discussion of the topic by e-mail, of
course, but it had died out.

Without going into the specifics of these particular issues, I want to make
a key observation: our ability to make progress on the DWARF revision depends
a lot on email interaction. E-mail allows time for thoughtful deliberation and
an opportunity for participation by those that cannot (or choose not) to take
part in the nominally bi-weekly meetings. One could hope that most issues
would in fact be more-or-less completely resolved before ever being discussed
at a meeting. But THAT KIND OF INTERACTION IS NOT HAPPENING!

So I make this plea: If you would like the DWARF revision to actually come
to fruition and completion, PLEASE take the time and trouble to pay serious
attention to proposals and discussions on the e-mail list and provide input
and feedback. I fear the whole process is in danger of quietly petering out
just when we are in sight of the goal.

If no one speaks up, then there will little reason to hold the next planned
meeting on 9 January (next week!) because nothing will have changed. Keep
that up a time or three more, and DWARF V2.1 Draft 5 will be the last ever
produced. Perhaps Draft 5 could enjoy the same no-formal-status but be a none-
the-less useful document like the DWARF V2 spec? Maybe that is good enough?
I think we can do better...

Please SPEAK UP.