DIP 1018--The Copy Constructor--Formal Review

[Andrei Alexandrescu]

On 2/25/19 7:23 PM, Nicholas Wilson wrote:
>> There are similarities and differences between our DIP process and 
>> paper submission reviews at conferences and journals everywhere; one 
>> key similarity is that the submitters are on hook for providing 
>> convincing submissions, whereas reviewers are not required to defend 
>> their reviews. It's an asymmetric relationship that occasionally 
>> frustrates, but it is as such for good reason and it works.
> 
> I've said before that that comparison is weak and not particularly 
> useful, irrespective of  its intention.

That you've said it before does not make it any more correct. We have 
intently modeled the acceptance process after that used by the review 
process used by conferences, journals, and standardization committees - 
naturally from the communities I have some familiarity with (Programming 
Languages, Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing, Algorithms, 
ISO C++). So the alleged similarities are more of a statement of fact 
than a metaphor.

There are differences, too, of which the public discussions in this 
forum is the main one. This is in danger of getting abused; open 
discussions around DIPs in this forum give the false impression that DIP 
authors have the authority to demand any extent of explanation and 
justification of a decision. We do not have the capacity to do that, and 
it would not be anymore appropriate than journal reviewers being 
required to provide detailed feedback to submitters' satisfaction. This 
whole notion of a meeting whereby Walter is grilled by a committee on 
why exactly he rejected DIP 1016 is Kafkaesque.

> The keyword here is "short". By suggesting that the action required is 
> to rewrite, the order is most definitely not short. Time is a valuable 
> resource, and a new DIP from scratch through the DIP process takes a lot 
> of it.

You can count on me to massage the bureaucracy out of the process if 
that's the bottleneck. The most significant bit is to focus on working 
together toward making the proposal better, as opposed to focusing on 
negotiating acceptance. But whether the DIP keeps the number or gets 
another one, if the revised document is a 95% cut and paste of the 
existing one, the review is liable to be a 95% cut and paste of the 
existing one.