On 8/17/07, Lauri Alanko <la at iki.fi> wrote:
> Where have you (and many others) gotten the impression that this is
> supposed to be a "democratic" process it he first place?
Good question. Looking at the RRRS mailing list archives, it
would appear the authors of the earliest revision of the report
(after the first) were most of the "Scheme community" interested in
the language design at the time. (I wasn't there, it's just an impression).
There are 2 issues: calling the document a standard for the language
"Scheme", and using the title "Revised^n Report on [the Algorithmic
Language] Scheme" in an academic journal. I don't know how the "right"
to do the first arises in general. It would seem distasteful to do the second
if a major contributor of the previous reports objected - particularly Steele
and Sussman, followed by Clinger, Rees, and Kelsey, since their names
appear in citations.
> The Steering Committee. Not "The People" or even "The Scheme
> Community". This has been the underlying premise of the R6RS process,
> and getting involved in it implicitly means trusting the judgement of
> the Steering Committee: if you don't trust them, you have no reason to
> expect anything worthwhile coming out of the process.
I wouldn't go that far. "Getting involved in it" is a very low bar, and a
new report is not the only worthwhile thing that could come out of the
process. I am not impugning the judgment of the Steering Committee
in noting this.
The record of the charter of the Steering Committee should probably
be available from r6rs.org, but I could only find it at
http://schemers.org/Documents/Standards/Charter/. Are there
records of the RRRS authors mailing list from 1998 onward? If so,
could they be made public?
> The Steering Committee has _chosen_ (relatively late in the game) to
> hear public opinions about the draft before making their
> decision. They even committed to honor the results of the vote, which
> really surprised me.
It is surprisingly generous, isn't it? I am gratified by the chance to be
heard, even if I end up disliking the outcome. The morass resulting from
requiring by absolute consensus in the previous reports probably
contributed to their decision.
Lynn
Received on Fri Aug 17 2007 - 08:34:05 UTC