Technical Architecture Group Explained

Technical Architecture Group
Formation:2001
Abbreviation:TAG
Founder:World Wide Web Consortium
Defunct:-->
Type:Nonprofit working group
Vat Id:(for European organizations) -->
Method:-->
Field:-->
Owner:World Wide Web Consortium

The W3C Technical Architecture Group (TAG) is a special working group within the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) created in 2001[1] to:[2] [3] [4]

The TAG consists of inventor of the Web and W3C director Sir Tim Berners-Lee, engineers elected by W3C member organizations, as well as participants directly appointed by Tim Berners-Lee.

Role and deliverables

Today, the TAG's primary responsibilities are two-fold:

  1. to conduct specification reviews ("design reviews") of new Web platform features, to ensure API design consistency, and respect for web users' security and privacy
  2. to document the design principles of the Web platform, which is done in the Web Platform Design Principles document,[5] the Ethical Web Principles document[6] as well as various separate "Findings" documents.[7] Notable past publications include Architecture of the World Wide Web, volume one (2004) [8] [9]

Google requires an approving TAG review for a Web platform feature to ship in Blink, Google Chrome's rendering engine.[10] [11] An approving review is also required for a W3C draft specification to be able to become a Recommendation.[12]

While the TAG is a W3C working group, design reviews are not limited to W3C specifications. The TAG is often asked to review TC39,[13] WHATWG,[14] or IETF[15] specifications as well.

Participants

The current participants (as of December 2021) are:

  1. Daniel Appelquist (Samsung Electronics) (Chair)
  2. Rossen Atanassov (Microsoft Corporation)
  3. Hadley Beeman (W3C Invited Expert)
  4. Tim Berners-Lee (W3C) (Chair)
  5. Kenneth Rohde Christiansen (Intel Corporation)
  6. Amy Guy (Digital Bazaar)
  7. Yves Lafon (W3C) (staff contact)
  8. Peter Linss (W3C Invited Expert) (Chair)
  9. Sangwhan Moon (Google)
  10. Theresa O'Connor (Apple, Inc.)
  11. Lea Verou (W3C Invited Expert)

Despite some participants having a corporate affiliation, when participating in TAG meetings they are expected to act in their personal capacity to find the best solutions for the Web, not just for any particular network, technology, vendor, or user.[4]

Notable past participants include:[16]

History

2012 Reform

During its first decade, the TAG had a very different role and responsibilities than what it does today.

The primary focus of the first three years of the TAG was on documenting in a clear and easily understood manner the architectural foundations of the Web. The result was published at the end of 2004 as Architecture of the World Wide Web, Volume One. It is written in a relatively informal style, with illustrations, and many of its conclusions are expressed in succinct 'principles', 'constraints' and 'good practice notes', such as:

After this publication and until 2012, the work of the TAG primarily resulted in publishing Findings documents, centered around XML, RDF, and URIs.[25]

In 2012, four prominent web developers felt that the TAG had become disconnected from the realities and pain points of web developers.[26] Led by Alex Russell, they dubbed themselves "the reformers" and participated in the 2012 TAG election for four vacant seats.[27] [28] [29] [30] All of them got elected.[31] It was only after this reform that design reviews of new specifications became a significant part of the TAG's work and the process for requesting a design review moved to GitHub and became streamlined.

First Party Sets Controversy

In February 2019, Google requested a TAG design review of their First Party Sets proposal[32] as required per their shipping policy. The proposal was rejected by the TAG in 2021. The group's review concluded that "the First Party Sets proposal harmful to the web in its current form".[33] [34] This resulted in Google updating its timeline for removing third-party cookies and postponing it to 2023.[35]

This follows earlier public statements by the TAG about prioritizing user security and privacy when conducting design reviews.[36]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: News Release: World Wide Web Consortium Forms Technical Architecture Group from Janet Daly on 2001-12-11 (www-tag@w3.org from December 2001). 2022-01-12. lists.w3.org.
  2. Web site: W3C Technical Architecture Group. 2022-01-11. www.w3.org.
  3. Web site: W3C Technical Architecture Group. 2022-01-11. tag.w3.org. en.
  4. Web site: W3C Process Document. 2022-01-12. www.w3.org.
  5. Web site: Web Platform Design Principles. 2022-01-11. www.w3.org.
  6. Web site: W3C TAG Ethical Web Principles. 2022-01-12. www.w3.org.
  7. Web site: Findings of the W3C Technical Architecture Group. 2022-01-11. www.w3.org.
  8. Web site: W3C Documents the Architecture of the Web - SitePoint. 2022-01-12. www.sitepoint.com. en.
  9. Web site: Architecture of the World Wide Web, Volume One. 2022-01-11. www.w3.org.
  10. Web site: Launching Features - The Chromium Projects. 2022-01-12. www.chromium.org.
  11. Web site: Intent to Explain: Demystifying the Blink Shipping Process. 2022-01-11. Chromium Blog. en.
  12. Web site: Document Review. 2022-01-11. www.w3.org.
  13. Web site: TAG Design reviews for TC39 specifications - GitHub. 2022-01-12. GitHub. en.
  14. Web site: TAG reviews for WHATWG specifications - GitHub. 2022-01-12. GitHub. en.
  15. Web site: TAG design reviews for IETF specifications - GitHub. 2022-01-12. GitHub. en.
  16. Web site: TAG members over time. 2022-01-21. tag.w3.org. en.
  17. Web site: 2002-08-02 . W3C Technical Architecture Group (TAG) . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20020802144355/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 2 August 2002 . dead.
  18. Web site: 2004-06-30 . W3C Technical Architecture Group (TAG) . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20040630071615/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 30 June 2004 . dead.
  19. Web site: 2006-07-03 . W3C Technical Architecture Group (TAG) . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20060703172049/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 3 July 2006 . dead.
  20. Web site: 2009-06-28 . TAG participants as of 2009 - Wayback Machine . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090628080148/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 28 June 2009 . dead.
  21. Web site: 2011-08-28 . TAG participants as of 2011 - Wayback Machine . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110828032450/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag . 28 August 2011 . dead.
  22. Web site: 2012-05-20 . TAG members as of 2012 - Wayback Machine . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20120520004128/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 20 May 2012 . dead.
  23. Web site: 2013-07-03 . TAG Members as of 2013 - Wayback Machine . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130703233440/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 3 July 2013 . dead.
  24. Web site: 2015-07-04 . W3C Technical Architecture Group as of 2015 . 2022-01-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20150704054803/http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/ . 4 July 2015 . dead.
  25. Web site: Main Articles: 'The W3C Technical Architecture Group', Ariadne Issue 51. 2022-01-12. www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk.
  26. Web site: Election Season. 2022-01-12. Infrequently Noted. en.
  27. Web site: Reforming the W3C TAG. 2022-01-12. Infrequently Noted. en.
  28. Web site: Marcos. Author. 2012-12-06. W3C TAG elections. 2022-01-12. Marcos Cáceres' blog. en-US.
  29. Web site: 2012-12-07. I'm Running to Reform the W3C's TAG. 2022-01-12. Katz Got Your Tongue. en-US.
  30. Web site: Statements about W3C TAG nominees for 2012 Election. 2022-01-12. www.w3.org.
  31. Web site: W3C News Archive: 2013 W3C. 2022-01-12. www.w3.org. en.
  32. Web site: First-Party Sets · Issue #342 · w3ctag/design-reviews. 2022-01-12. GitHub. en.
  33. Web site: Schiff. Allison. 2021-04-14. Influential W3C Working Group Calls Privacy Sandbox Proposal 'Harmful'. 2022-01-12. AdExchanger. en-US.
  34. Web site: Tim Anderson. W3C Technical Architecture Group slaps down Google's proposal to treat multiple domains as same origin. 2022-01-12. www.theregister.com. en.
  35. Web site: Tim Anderson. Google updates timeline for unpopular Privacy Sandbox, which will kill third-party cookies in Chrome by 2023. 2022-01-12. www.theregister.com. en.
  36. Web site: Web feature developers told to dial up attention on privacy and security. 2022-01-12. TechCrunch. en-US.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Technical Architecture Group".

Except where otherwise indicated, Everything.Explained.Today is © Copyright 2009-2024, A B Cryer, All Rights Reserved. Cookie policy.