[occi-wg] occi-wg Digest, Vol 15, Issue 12

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Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2010 17:20:57 
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Subject: occi-wg Digest, Vol 15, Issue 12

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Today's Topics:

   1. Fwd: How I tried to keep OCCI alive (and failed miserably)
      (Sam Johnston)
   2. Re: How I tried to keep OCCI alive (and failed miserably)
      (Andre Merzky)
   3. To all the members of the OCCI WG (Steven Newhouse)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2010 21:27:57 +0200
From: Sam Johnston <samj at samj.net>
Subject: [occi-wg] Fwd: How I tried to keep OCCI alive (and failed
	miserably)
To: occi-wg at ogf.org
Message-ID:
	<AANLkTimuQcsf62e9NyvU2ffHbCfBnbRrXJAZMdwe6i2F at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Sam Johnston <samj at samj.net>
Date: Thu, Jun 17, 2010 at 9:25 PM
Subject: [Sam Johnston] How I tried to keep OCCI alive (and failed
miserably)

I was going to let this one slide but following a calumniatory
missive<http://www.ogf.org/pipermail/occi-wg/2010-June/001867.html>to
his "followers" by the Open
Cloud Computing Interface <http://www.occi-wg.org/>'s self-proclaimed "Founder
& Chair", Sun refugee Thijs Metsch <http://twitter.com/befreax>, I have
little choice but to respond in my defense (particularly as "The Chairs"
were actively soliciting
<http://twitter.com/dizz/status/16397788487>followup from others
on-list in support).

Basically a debate came to a head that has been brewing on- and
off-list<http://www.ogf.org/pipermail/occi-wg/2010-March/001703.html>for
months regarding the Open
Grid Forum (OGF) <http://www.ogf.org/>'s attempts to prevent me from
licensing *my own contributions* (essentially the entire normative
specification) under a permissive Creative
Commons<http://www.creativecommons.org/>license (as an additional
option to the restrictive
OGF license <http://www.ogf.org/About/abt_policies_copyright.php>) and/or
submit them to the IETF as previously agreed and as required by the OGF's
own policies <http://www.ogf.org/documents/GFD.1.pdf>. This was on the
grounds that "*Most existing cloud computing specifications are available
under CC licenses and I don't want to give anyone any excuses to choose
another standard over ours*" and that the IETF has an excellent track record
of producing high quality, interoperable, open specifications by way of a
controlled yet open process. This should come as no surprise to those of you
who know I am and will always be a huge supporter of open cloud, open source
and open standards.

The OGF process had failed to deliver after over 12 months of deadline
extensions - the current spec is frozen in an incomplete state (lacking
critical features like collections, search, billing, security, etc.) as a
result of being prematurely pushed into public comment, nobody is happy with
it (including myself), the community has all but dissipated (except for a
few hard core supporters, previously including myself) and software
purporting to implement it actually implements something completely
different altogether (see for
yourself<http://www.opennebula.org/documentation:rel1.4:occidd>).
There
was no light at the end of the tunnel and with both
OGF29<http://www.gridforum.org/OGF29/>and
IETF78 <http://www.ietf78.nl/home.html> just around the corner I yesterday
took a desperate gamble to keep OCCI alive (as a CC-licensed spec, an IETF
Internet-Draft or both).

I confirmed that I was well within my rights to revoke any copyright,
trademark and other rights previously granted (apparently it was amateur
hour as OGF had failed to obtain an irrevocable license from me for my
contributions) and volunteered to do so if restrictions on reuse by others
weren't lifted and/or the specification submitted to the IETF process as
agreed and required by their own policies. Thijs' colleague (and quite
probably his boss at Platform Computing <http://www.platform.com/>),
Christopher Smith (who doubles as OGF's outgoing VP of Standards) promptly
responded, questioning my motives (which I can assure you are pure) and
issuing a terse legal threat about how the "OGF will protect its rights"
(against me over my own contributions no less). Thijs then followed up
shortly after saying that they "see the secretary position as vacant from
now on" and despite claims to the
contrary<http://twitter.com/papaspyrou/status/16403013420>I really
couldn't give a rats arse about a title bestowed upon me by a
past-its-prime organisation struggling (and failing I might add) to maintain
relevance. My only concern is that OCCI have a good home and if anything
Platform have just captured the sort of control over it as VMware enjoy over
DMTF/vCloud, with Thijs being the only remaining active editor.

I thought that would be the end of it and had planned to let sleeping dogs
lie until today's disgraceful, childish, coordinated and most of all
completely unnecessary
attack<http://www.ogf.org/pipermail/occi-wg/2010-June/001867.html>on
an unpaid volunteer that rambled about "constructive technical debate"
and "community driven consensus", thanking me for my "meaningful
contributions" but then calling on others to take up the pitchforks by
"welcom[ing] any comments on this statement" on- or off-list. The attacks
then continued on Twitter with another OGF
official<http://twitter.com/papaspyrou> claiming
that this "*was a consensus decision within a group of, say, 20+ active and
many many (300+) passive participants*" (despite this being the first any of
us had heard of it) and then calling my claims of copyright ownership "*genuine
bullshit*" and report of an implementor instantly pulling out because they
(and I quote) "*can't implement something if things are not stable*" a "*damn
lie*", claiming I was "*pissed*" and should "*get over it and stop crying*"
(needless to say they were promptly blocked).*
*
Anyway as you can see there's more to it than Thijs' diatribe would have you
believe and so far as I'm concerned OCCI, at least in it's current form, is
long since dead. I'm undecided as to whether to revoke OGF's licenses at
this time but it probably doesn't matter as they agree I retain the
copyrights and I think their chance of success is negligible - nobody in
their right mind would implement the product of such a dysfunctional group
and those who already did have long since
found<http://blog.opennebula.org/?p=185>
alternatives <http://blog.opennebula.org/?p=528>. That's not to say the
specification won't live on in another form but now the OGF have decided to
go nuclear it's going to have to be in a more appropriate forum - one that
furthers the standard rather than constantly holding it back.

*Protip*: None of this has anything to do with my current employer so let's
keep it that way.

--
Posted By Sam Johnston to Sam
Johnston<http://samj.net/2010/06/how-i-tried-to-keep-occi-alive-and.html>at
6/17/2010 09:25:00 PM
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------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2010 23:34:45 +0200
From: Andre Merzky <andre at merzky.net>
Subject: Re: [occi-wg] How I tried to keep OCCI alive (and failed
	miserably)
To: Sam Johnston <samj at samj.net>
Cc: occi-wg at ogf.org
Message-ID: <20100617213445.GB38082 at jonas>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

Dear Sam,

apologies, but this will be my only mail on this topic.  I honestly
hope we can avoid a major flamewar.


Quoting [Sam Johnston] (Jun 17 2010):
> Date:    Thu, 17 Jun 2010 21:27:57 +0200
> From:    Sam Johnston <samj at samj.net>
> To:      occi-wg at ogf.org
> Subject: [occi-wg] Fwd: How I tried to keep OCCI alive (and failed miserably)
> 
> I was going to let this one slide but following a [2]calumniatory
> missive to his "followers" by the [3]Open Cloud Computing
> Interface's self-proclaimed "Founder & Chair", Sun refugee
> [4]Thijs Metsch, I have little choice but to respond in my defense
> (particularly as "The Chairs" were [5]actively soliciting followup
> from others on-list in support).

The OCCI BoF was organized by Thijs and Ignacio:
http://ogf.org/gf/event_schedule/index.php?id=1567

Thijs is OCCI chair:
https://forge.gridforum.org/projects/occi-wg

His mail to you did not mention his 'title'.

just saying ;-)


> Basically a debate came to a head that has been [6]brewing on- and
> off-list for months regarding the [7]Open Grid Forum (OGF)'s
> attempts to prevent me from licensing my own contributions
> (essentially the entire normative specification)

svn and mercurial logs attribute about 2/3 of the document contents
to you.  Mailman tells me that you generated about 20% of the mails
on this list.  Your contribution to OCCI is indeed substantial, and
obviously the single largest one.

On the other hand, for good or for worse, the current documents,
implementations, discussions etc would not exist had you been
working on it alone.  To claim that the spec *as is* is your own
(essentially), but to blame its shortcomings solely on others
(below) is simply getting things wrong.  

This *is* a community.  This is exactly the fact Thijs' mail, and
the endless threads before, have been about, and this is the point
I, personally, think you have difficulties to accept.  *This* OCCI
is *not* the product of the individual Sam Johnston.  


> under a permissive [8]Creative Commons license (as an additional
> option to the [9]restrictive OGF license)

Uhm, you are beating a dead horse here: despite our thread of close
to 100 mails your voice was the *only* one arguing for CC - no
single other group member, nor GFSG, nor the board, could follow
your arguments that OGF IPR is in fact inhibiting any valid use
case.

Again, this is a community: there were ~10 explicit voices in the
thread to stick to OGF IPR rules, your single  voice against.  OGF
works consensus driven.  Period.  GFSG and OGF board discussed your
arguments, as we understood them, and tried to make the rules more
explicit were they were unclear.  

Yes, you can ignore the popular vote, and all arguments, all
questions, and all attempts to accomodate your requests.  But do you
honestly expect that people consider you a team player, with 'pure
intentions'?


> and/or submit them to the IETF as previously agreed and as
> [10]required by the OGF's own policies.  This was on the grounds
> that "Most existing cloud computing specifications are available
> under CC licenses and I don't want to give anyone any excuses to
> choose another standard over ours" and that the IETF has an
> excellent track record of producing high quality, interoperable,
> open specifications by way of a controlled yet open process. This
> should come as no surprise to those of you who know I am and will
> always be a huge supporter of open cloud, open source and open
> standards.

"required by the OGF's own policies": No, its is not.  For one,
GFD.1 is superceded by GFD.152.  Also, GFD.1 explains that OGF is
modeled after IETF, in terms of process, but not that GFDs are to be
submitted to IETF.  

I actually think, however, that submitting OCCI to IETF is an great
proposal.  I am not sure about the technical details though: for
example, it would not make sense (to me) to have two incompatible
specifications under the same name.  Anyway, OGF has strong ties
into the IETF community, and I am sure a way can be found to
accomodate the specific use case.  It has been done before IIRC.
That is my personal opinion though, not that of OGF or GFSG.  In any
case, submitting to IETF for comments will not affect OGF IPR.


> The OGF process had failed to deliver after over 12 months of
> deadline extensions

OGF does not deliver - people do.  OGF is a volonteer army (yes,
suprise: you are not the only volonteer here).  My (probably
limited) experience shows that groups which meet often face to face,
and have a good discussion culture, progress most efficiently.
Uhm... ;-)


> - the current spec is frozen in an incomplete state (lacking
> critical features like collections, search, billing, security, etc.) as
> a result of being prematurely pushed into public comment, nobody is
> happy with it (including myself), the community has all but dissipated
> (except for a few hard core supporters, previously including myself)
> and software purporting to implement it actually implements something
> completely different altogether ([11]see for yourself).

Again: you claim the OCCI spec is 'essentially' yours, but all its
failings are OGF-made?   Strange...  ;-)

Implementations: OCCI is not even a published specification yet.
Give it some time.  AFAICS, the interest to implement (and also to
use) OCCI is still strong.


> There was no light at the end of the tunnel and with both
> [12]OGF29 and [13]IETF78 just around the corner I yesterday took a
> desperate gamble to keep OCCI alive (as a CC-licensed spec, an
> IETF Internet-Draft or both).
> I confirmed that I was well within my rights to revoke any copyright,
> trademark and other rights previously granted (apparently it was
> amateur hour as OGF had failed to obtain an irrevocable license from me
> for my contributions) and volunteered to do so if restrictions on reuse
> by others weren't lifted and/or the specification submitted to the IETF
> process as agreed and required by their own policies.

Uhm, you were trying to keep OCCI alive by revoking your granted
rights?  "Either you do as I say or else..."?  My son does that,
too.  He is 7.  We are concerned actually, he should be over that
phase ... ;-)

Sam, face it: you are not a team player.  Your are technically
brillant, but it is close to impossible to work *together* like
this.  It works only for you, alone.


> Thijs' colleague (and quite probably his boss at [14]Platform
> Computing), Christopher Smith (who doubles as OGF's outgoing VP of
> Standards) 

For the records: Chris is not Thijs boss.


> promptly responded, questioning my motives (which I can assure you
> are pure) and issuing a terse legal threat about how the "OGF will
> protect its rights" (against me over my own contributions no
> less). Thijs then followed up shortly after saying that they "see
> the secretary position as vacant from now on" 

Please do understand that this is not a personal vendetta of Thijs
or Chris or anybody else.  If you want, its a conspiracy: my mail
count on that topic, i.e., on *YOU*, is 140.  Over the last 10 days.
I was not on all threads (fortunately).    There have been multiple
calls over the last days, to conspire of course.

As Thijs said: "This is not an action we take lightly".  Believe
him.  Stop attacking him personally.  Attack OGF if you must.  Its a
community, you know? ;-)


> and despite [15]claims to the contrary I really couldn't give a
> rats arse about a title bestowed upon me by a past-its-prime
> organisation struggling (and failing I might add) to maintain
> relevance.

Uhm, why *did* you pick OGF actually?  This is a serious question.
Would any other *community* have worked out any better?

Also serious: you may want to consider writing specs on your own,
completely, and submitting them as individual.  It might well be
that you are more productive that way, and that the specs improve.
Hard to tell in advanvce of course, just an idea.

In any case: you all *did* pick OGF, and its rules.  Next time,
please think about it *before* you join a community.


> My only concern is that OCCI have a good home and if anything
> Platform have just captured the sort of control over it as VMware
> enjoy over DMTF/vCloud, with Thijs being the only remaining active
> editor.

Uhm, Sam, I hate to tell you, but the fact that the two persons (out
of ~10?) you're having trouble with are from Platform does not mean
OGF is controled by Platform.  OGF is a volonteer army.  Everybody
can nominate anybody as chair or AD.  Positions are hold by
consensus of the community.  I don't have statostics about chairs at
hand, but the AD affiliation is quite diverse:
http://www.ogf.org/About/abt_steering.php

It is as often with your mails: lots of effort to distinguish
ranting from arguments :-(  Please use twitter for ranting, and this
list for discussions.


> I thought that would be the end of it and had planned to let
> sleeping dogs lie until today's disgraceful, childish, coordinated
> and most of all completely unnecessary [16]attack on an unpaid
> volunteer that rambled about "constructive technical debate" and
> "community driven consensus", thanking me for my "meaningful
> contributions" but then calling on others to take up the
> pitchforks by "welcom[ing] any comments on this statement" on- or
> off-list.

Sam, its not an attack.  It is a attempt to get the group functional
again, to avoid deadlocks, and to avoid decisions not supported by
group consensus.

Likely, this sounds like the very same rambling to you, sorry for
that - we see meaning in those points.


> The attacks then continued on Twitter with another [17]OGF
> official claiming that this "was a consensus decision within a
> group of, say, 20+ active and many many (300+) passive
> participants" (despite this being the first any of us had heard of
> it) 

Well, I can support the cited statement.  That makes 4.  Keep
counting ;-)


> and then calling my claims of copyright ownership "genuine
> bullshit" and report of an implementor instantly pulling out
> because they (and I quote) "can't implement something if things
> are not stable" a "damn lie", claiming I was "pissed" and should
> "get over it and stop crying" (needless to say they were promptly
> blocked).

Yes, we are concerned about that, too.  OCCI needs to be stable.


> Anyway as you can see there's more to it than Thijs' diatribe 

Again, please stop attacking Thijs - he is the messenger.


> would have you believe and so far as I'm concerned OCCI, at least
> in it's current form, is long since dead. 
> I'm undecided as to whether to revoke OGF's licenses at this time
> but it probably doesn't matter as they agree I retain the
> copyrights and I think their chance of success is negligible -
> nobody in their right mind would implement the product of such a
> dysfunctional group and those who already did have long since
> [18]found [19]alternatives.

Alternatives are healthy.  "The nice thing about standards is that
you have so many to choose from." (A.S. Tanenbaum).  

But really: in our opinion OCCI very much alive and kicking, and we
hope it stays that way.  But I am known to be a terrible
fortuneteller :-P


> That's not to say the specification won't live on in another form
> but now the OGF have decided to go nuclear it's going to have to
> be in a more appropriate forum - one that furthers the standard
> rather than constantly holding it back.  Protip: None of this has
> anything to do with my current employer so let's keep it that way.

Sam, honestly: I wish you all the best.  Please reconsider your
actions: the OGF OCCI group would very much welcome your continued
input!  Honestly!  Really!  Really really!  We would like to do
things our own way tough: consensus driven.  That is about the only
condition we have, really.

Thanks, Andre.

-- 
Nothing is ever easy.


------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 00:20:45 +0200
From: Steven Newhouse <Steven.Newhouse at cern.ch>
Subject: [occi-wg] To all the members of the OCCI WG
To: "occi-wg at ogf.org" <occi-wg at ogf.org>
Cc: "ogf-board at ogf.org" <ogf-board at ogf.org>
Message-ID:
	<471AD4CD1F3AC846911E0C520A522E720CCAC3DA at cernxchg74.cern.ch>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

This is perhaps one of the saddest days in the many years that OGF/GGF has =
acted as an umbrella for standards collaboration. As a community, we have n=
ever had to deal with a situation where an individual has repeatedly chosen=
 to act in a divisive manner, ignoring the wishes and contributions of the =
majority of their colleagues in a working group, and ignoring the processes=
 and rules that they themselves signed up to when they began contributing.

This situation is not really about standards or about the rights and wrongs=
 of IP policies, where cloud standards should evolve or whatever.  It's abo=
ut trust.  It's about trusting your working group members to respect their =
colleagues and their colleagues' contributions and opinions, it's about tru=
sting that someone will adhere to the express commitments they made when th=
ey joined the community.

The chairs of the OCCI working group, and lots of members of the OGF commun=
ity, have, on many occasions worked with Sam to try and achieve our shared =
goal of a well defined and implemented OCCI specification.  This work is of=
 fundamental importance to the OGF community and to the broader cloud commu=
nity.  Sam's contributions have been exceptional, but this specification is=
, and will be, the result of team work, of contributions ranging from activ=
e writing of the content, to debate about it that improves its quality, to =
implementation and so forth.  This work is the result of the labours of man=
y, no matter how great the contribution of one.  It is the community that v=
alidates the work, that ensures its quality and that results in implementat=
ions.  That community is the OCCI Working Group.  It is not Sam Johnston.

There are many imperfections in any and all communities or organisations, i=
ncluding OGF.   But OGF remains one of the easiest within which to work, to=
 collaborate, to validate and to implement.  Sam has decided that it is not=
 for him, which is his right, and which we respect.  Regrettably the chairs=
 of the group, with the unanimous approval and support of the community's e=
lected leaders, have decided that Sam can no longer act as secretary of the=
 working group.  He has become impossible to work with.  Nonetheless we tha=
nk him whole heartedly for his contributions, in spite of this situation.  =
And, should he wish to continue to collaborate under the same set of rules =
that he and the rest of the working group signed up to when they joined, he=
 will be most welcome.

In the meantime the OCCI working group will continue, as will its work.  We=
 will do what is required to move our specification forward and we expect t=
o reengage many past contributors who had found engagement difficult.  The =
OGF community's leaders continue to stand in full support of the OCCI worki=
ng group chairs, the working group they help lead and the work that this gr=
oup undertakes.

Let's move on!

Steven Newhouse
OGF Board Chairman


------------------------------

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End of occi-wg Digest, Vol 15, Issue 12
***************************************