Thoughts on yesterday's meeting

I did not speak up much yesterday because I was mulling on what was
    making me uncomfortable. I think I have it now.

    

    From the TC's beginning, I urged that we follow the principle of
    consensus for the conduct of members. We've had some uncomfortable
    discussions at times (index terminology and presentational attribute
    discussions come to mind). But the principle has served to help us
    move forward, particularly at times when we've struggled with "Best
    is the enemy of the good." Standards are dirty, messy compromises,
    not unlike democracies. But if we can work across the aisle, we all
    move forward for the common good of a larger constituency who just
    want better lives.

    

    I recall something that former member and mentor Paul Grosso said
    about one particularly odious, early decision; "I don't agree with
    it, but I won't lie down in the road over it." As a TC body, we need
    to summon that thought continually to help us keep our schedules and
    goals on track. It's okay to say, "No sir,  I still don't like it,"
    and then we need to move on; a user community is waiting to get our
    blessing for them to move forward with their own use of the
    standard.

    

    Therefore, for the sake of keeping the DITA 1.3 approval on our
    hoped-for timeline, I recommend that we hold to a Pareto-like rule
    of 80/20 for issue disposition: let's make sure that we have
    prioritized and handled the 20 percent of issues that cause up to
    80% of the pain, and likewise accept that we may need to defer as
    much as 80% of minor issues that are causing only 20% of the
    historical pain. If we try to cover all possible issues,
    exhaustively, DITA 1.3 will surely suffer an embarrassing slip into
    2016, a result we could not be proud of.

    

    
-- 

      
      
        
Don R. Day

        
Co-Founder, ContelligenceGroup.com

        
Founding Chair, OASIS

            DITA Technical Committee

        
LinkedIn: donrday   Twitter:

          @donrday

        
About.me: Don R. Day   Skype:

          don.r.day

      
      
        
"Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?

        
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?"

        
--T.S. Eliot