Re: CONSENSUS: Contenders Should Negotiate

Brad Knowles (brad@his.com)
Wed, 28 Feb 1996 07:35:52 -0500 

At 5:52 PM 2/27/96, James M. Galvin wrote:

> How are we to accomplish this?  Who is the proponent of which contender and
> why?  What is the criteria against which we should create a harmonized
> protocol?

    If no one else has answered this one yet, let me give it a try.

    The two primary contenders that I am aware of that were being
discussed in this context were S/MIME and PGP, with the
representative from RSA speaking from his sense of what would likely
be possible as a strawman schedule for at least the first two steps
(1 -- identify differences, 2 -- justify them), while I think Mike
Elkins was expected to speak from his sense of the PGP community what
they'd be likely to at least commit to as a strawman schedule.

    There were other members of the "PGP Contingent" and they didn't
seem to be vocally opposed to that schedule, so there is at least
some indication that the proposed schedule is likely to be accepted
from their perspective.

    I wasn't aware of another representative from RSA or the rest of
the S/MIME community, so that side might be a bit more fluid.


    So far as I recall, there was no explict omission of MSP (I
belive the NSA and/or Spyrus representatives made mention of being
interested in being part of that process, and at least making noises
at the time that the proposed schedule at least sounded plausible),
and there wasn't any explict omission of any other standards
(including MOSS), although I don't recall anyone from the "MOSS
Community" speaking up one way or the other regarding their interest
in participating in that process or any public statement positive or
negative regarding the proposed schedule.


    When Dave said something to the effect of "the interested parties
would get together to determine their differences and then justify
them, and the interested parties know who they are", he certainly was
looking primarily at the PGP and S/MIME folks mentioned above.
However, if you want to step up as the MOSS representative and make
some comment regarding the schedule, I can't think of anyone else
more likely to represent that community or better suited to do so.

        -Brad