RE: draft-ietf-impp-cpim-msgfmt syntax

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dave Crocker [mailto:[email protected]]
> 
> Jonathan> I would submit that the cost of changing ones mind 
> on old issues will
> Jonathan> frequently incur the highest cost.
... 
> Perhaps you would offer some comments on the actual efficacy
> of the existing technical choice, with respect to the concerns
> that I raised.

You cut out the most important part of the point that Jonathan
was trying to make:

 "Like it or not, people implement I-Ds, especially ones that
  have been around for as long as CPIM-MSGFMT and PIDF. Making
  a major change, like converting to XML, this late in the game,
  results in people needing to implement BOTH the old draft (for 
  compatibility with old implementations) and the new."

You've admitted that your issue is not technical per se ("There
is nothing wrong with the current spec, from a computer science
standpoint"), but practical. However, when a practical rebuttal
is offered, you criticize it for being non-technical. That leaves
me confused.

To rephrase what Jonathan said: standards work suffers pretty
serious multiplier effects.  Small bits of writing cause large
amounts of programming; a complete rewrite of an already
implemented protocol doubles that work (per programmer and then,
of course, multiplied by the number of such efforts), and larger
amounts of debugging and regression testing, and even larger
amounts of re-deployment and system upgrade hassle. And that
doesn't even take into consideration the additional development
required to detect and interoperate with "legacy" implementations.

/a



  [reminder: [email protected] for non-technical discussions, please]