Your experience and ideas on how to start-out are useful. On 27 May 2013 16:13, Yoav Nir <y...@checkpoint.com> wrote:
> LCD? > > Anyway, What I found most useful when I was starting out 9 years ago, was > to look over the list of areas and working groups ( > http://tools.ietf.org/area/ ) and find out which of them are working on > something that is of interest to me. In my case it was mostly the security > area, and the IPsec working group, since that is what I was working on in > my day job. I subscribed to that list and some others that were also > related to what I was working on (TLS, PKIX). > > So the best thing is to subscribe to the mailing lists, both those that > interest you personally and those that are of interest to your employer (if > there are such groups). > > Step 2 is to lurk for a couple of weeks at least, and just read what > others are posting. If they're talking about a particular draft, it's easy > to find on one of the IETF sites and read it. So you read the drafts, and > read what people are saying about the drafts. This teaches you both about > what the group is working on, and the (for lack of a better term) > "political" part - who are the participants and what are they like. You > might also want to read the Tao document, although different groups have > varying dynamics. > > After a while, you've read the drafts, you've read what some people are > saying, and you may have formed an opinion, either about the draft itself, > or about one of the comments. That's a good time to speak up by sending a > message to the list. Maybe the draft got something wrong. Maybe the comment > is only correct in certain contexts, but doesn't describe some situation > you're familiar with. Maybe in reading the draft you find it hard to figure > out what an implementation should do in a certain case, and you present the > case, and ask that it be clarified. Maybe the proposed protocol would > require clients, servers, or middleboxes to allocate more memory than > implementations that you know can afford. Such comments, and even better, > proposed fixes are how you build a reputation in the IETF for knowing your > stuff. You can also volunteer to review a whole document, or volunteer to > write a missing section. That is how you build a reputation for being > useful. Both are necessary for success in the IETF. > > Step 4 is when you have an idea of your own, or you read someone else's > idea and you want to participate. In that case you either write your own > draft or join someone else in writing one. It's often not enough to just > write it. You also have to get people to read it, post about it to the > correct lists, and in general "sell" it and gather support. It is at about > that time that you start to feel the need to attend meetings, but you can > get some things done even without it. > > Hope this helps > > Yoav > > On May 27, 2013, at 3:33 PM, Nthabiseng Pule <np...@lca.org.ls> > wrote: > > > as, > > > > I am new to the IETF. I would like to contribute any way I can, but the > learning curve seems steep indeed. I am from an LCD country. I have the > necessary resources but I just don't know where to start. > > > > Some guidance would be welcome. I am reading on stuff and hope that one > day I will be able to make some meaningful contribution. > > > > > > Nthabiseng Pule > > > > > > > > On 27 May 2013, at 1:52 PM, Arturo Servin <aser...@lacnic.net> wrote: > > > >> John, > >> > >> Good summary. > >> > >> I would add a "steep learning-curve" to start participating. It takes > time to get conformable in participating in mailing list and reviewing > drafts for I think two reasons. One is to get know how the IETF works, and > another to catch-up in knowing the topic in relation with other WG > participants. > >> > >> About the remote hub I think it would be good to give it a try. > >> > >> Regards, > >> as > >> > >> On 27 May 2013, at 02:52, John Levine wrote: > >> > >>> I think this is a summary of the issues people have mentioned that > >>> discourage participation from LDCs, in rough order of importance. > >>> > >>> * People aren't aware the IETF exists, or what it does, or that it has > >>> an open participation model > >>> > >>> * People don't read and write English well enough to be comfortable > >>> participating > >>> > >>> * People are unaccustomed to and perhaps uncomfortable expressing > >>> overt disagreement > >>> > >>> * People don't think they have anything to contribute to an > organization > >>> that is mostly people from rich countries > >>> > >>> * People don't have adequate Internet access for mail, or to use the > >>> remote participation tools > >>> > >>> I have to say that I don't see one or two meetings in South America > >>> addressing any of these. Given that the incremental cost to the > >>> participants, compared to meeting in North America, would likely be on > >>> the order of a million dollars, it seems to me very likely that there > >>> are better ways to spend the money. > >>> > >>> For example, if language and net access is a problem, it might be > >>> interesting to set up a remote participation center in B.A. during one > >>> of the North American meetings (it's one time zone off from Toronto) > >>> with screens and cameras, paid interpreters, and a few volunteers to > >>> help explain what's going on. > >>> > >>> R's, > >>> John > >> > >
