Notice Periods

Mon Oct 20 16:50:46 UTC 2003

>So -- how much notice would the operator community want before 
>deploying new software?  What about for enterprises?  (We all know that 
>stuff *can* be deployed more quickly in emergency circumstances.  We 
>also know the problems that that can lead to, which is why we generally 
>want testing and controlled deployment.)

>From the technical point of view, in order to provide proper
design, technical review and testing prior to deployment, I 
would think that there should be a minimum of 3 months notice.

>From the political point of view I agree with the person
who said "after Verisign's contract expires". In other
words, the notice should be given prior to contract
renewal so that the action can be discussed as part of
the contract renewal process. However, the actual deployment
should not happen until at least 3 months after contract
renewal to allow for technical activities.

It is not appropriate to require network operators to
take actions to adapt to a change that may or may not
occur depending on some policy approval process. The
two notice periods need to be decoupled so that the
policy approval is done first and then the technical
notice period begins.

--Michael Dillon