VC WG Telco — Minutes

Date: 2021-12-08

See also the Agenda and the IRC Log

Attendees

Present: Ivan Herman, Brent Zundel, Charles Lehner, Ted Thibodeau Jr., Dave Longley, David Chadwick, Ryan Grant, Manu Sporny, Kevin Dean

Regrets:

Guests:

Chair: Brent Zundel

Scribe(s): Dave Longley

Content:

Brent Zundel: Agenda is straightforward, we’ll talk about the draft charter, do PR review, issue triage, and working through 1.1 issues..
… Anything else to add to the agenda today?.
… I do want to start with a question for Ivan – have you heard back from Phillippe about this WG charter being extended?.

Ivan Herman: Yes, it was on the W3M agenda today, I’ll have a call about some questions with him and some others on Friday, but it’s happening..

Brent Zundel: Thanks, that’s what I was hoping to hear..

1. VCWG Draft Charter Issues.

Brent Zundel: There have been a number of issues. This is our list: https://github.com/w3c/vc-wg-charter/issues?q=is%3Aissue+is%3Aopen+sort%3Aupdated-asc.

1.1. External organizations - ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 17/WG 10 (issue vc-wg-charter#20)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#20.

Brent Zundel: External orgs. This was addressed in PR #26 which I’ve merged after getting feedback on it..

See github pull request vc-wg-charter#31.

Brent Zundel: It adds the open badges, the ISO committee for the mDL, it also adds the ISO committed for other mDL work..

Manu Sporny: A quick note. I raised PR #31 to add ecosystem support for mDL..
… We had, in the Credentials CG, we had an individual from the ISO WG do a presentation, Andrew Hughes. We also announced that we have an interoperability test suite for mDL..
… That conversation has been kicked off, this PR adds a non-normative work item to work on VC data models and data guidance and uses mDL as an example. It basically says we may put out non-normative guidance that helps interop in general..

Brent Zundel: Thank you, Manu..
… Folks should check out that PR, it’s very straightforward, it adds a line of potential deliverables there..
… I guess the question with this issue #20 … I was hoping to hear back from Kristina – everything she said she wanted has now been put into the charter so I think we can close this..
… Is anyone opposed to that?.
… Not hearing any opposition, so I’ll close the issue over the meeting once the notes are in on that..

1.2. Verifiable Credential Linked Data Integrity work should happen in a Linked Data working group (issue vc-wg-charter#21)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#21.

Brent Zundel: VC LDI work to happen. We haven’t heard from Mike Jones on this in almost 2 weeks. We don’t know if there’s much we can do at this point but hope to hear on this..

Manu Sporny: One thing to mention here is that I think that by calling it Linked Data Integrity, we are communicating the wrong thing. The first wrong thing is that you have to use Linked Data to use the data integrity portions. Or rather, that the stuff we’re working on don’t require LD – at least the data integrity portions. You can shove a JWT in somewhere and sign it..
… The “LDI” spec right now does not require you to do canonicalization based on LD, you can use non-LD canonicalization mechanisms such as JCS. You can choose not to canonicalize at all, and therefore there are variations that have nothing to do with LD. I’m wondering if we should rename the work to VC data integrity / data integrity..
… Plus all of the arguments that have been made to date. That may not be compelling to make but it’s another angle we can take..

Ivan Herman: That’s fine, but as far as I remember, the charter text itself refers to the RDF canonicalization work which is planned to be done, etc. It’s not only the title, but the whole description that’s there in the draft charter that has to be adapted, I think..

Manu Sporny: I agree, Ivan. I think the description right now is misleading. We may want to mention JCS as well, which is already an IETF RFC as another canonicalization mechanism. I’m happy to take an action to try and reword it before we have buy in from the group that this is a direction that the group is comfortable with..

David Chadwick: Obviously, I’m one of the proponents of not using LD, so I would be imposed to only working on LDI, that’s too narrow a scope. Just like version 1 of the data model allowed both LD and non-LD, the work should continue in that vein and make it clear that we’re doing so..
… I want VC to get world wide take up. I want the barriers to world wide take up to be as low as possible. We should support non-LD because that has a lower barrier to take up and leads to greater success of this WG overall..

Brent Zundel: Anything else on this issue?.

Ryan Grant: I also support not drawing in LD where it isn’t absolutely necessary to VCs. That’s all..

1.3. Protocols and APIs should remain out of scope (issue vc-wg-charter#24)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#24.

Brent Zundel: We talked about this issue during our last meeting, Orie made some comments, still no response from Mike Jones. Any recommendations on how to move this issue forward?.

Manu Sporny: I think we should close the issue. People want to talk about this, work is proceeding, Mike needs to make the case for why the non-normative version of this needs to be out of scope, why we can’t talk about it at all. It’s a strange ask..

Manu Sporny: +1 to pending close, we need a response..

Brent Zundel: We could put a pending close label on it and ping Mike Jones and see if he can respond to the feedback and make his case. Any opposition to that?.

Dave Longley: +1 to that approach..

Brent Zundel: If we still haven’t heard from Mike the next time we meet we can close it..

1.4. Use of unclear term “specific style of supporting infrastructure” (issue vc-wg-charter#25)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#25.

Brent Zundel: Issue #25 is about the specific style of supporting infrastructure. I altered my PR so that it brought in Ted’s suggestions. I pulled the PR in after getting that feedback. So now the charter says it’s out of scope for us to mandate to any specific style of infrastructure as a DLT..

Manu Sporny: +1 to the change. It makes it very specific what we’re talking about there..
… We may want to spell out DLT or link to it because people may not know what it means, but great job..

Brent Zundel: I will go ahead and say we believe this has been addressed and close the issue. Any opposition?.
… Hearing none..

1.5. standardize verification processes for a variety of well understood use cases (issue vc-wg-charter#30)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#30.

Brent Zundel: This is from Kyle Den Hartog. I don’t think we’ve looked at this yet – Kyle not on the call too early for his timezone..

Kevin Dean: This is going to be difficult. Verifying the content … the business process can be radically different from one to the next. He is talking about common validation. Talking about driver’s licenses and the like..

Manu Sporny: I agree with what Kevin just said. I am a bit confused because he jumps between verification and validation patterns. He says standardize verification processes but at the very bottom he says he’d like common validation patterns standardized. And verification and validation are not the same..
… Right now the spec has a list of things to do for verification like check the signature and credential status. I think we need to ask Kyle if he’s talking about verification or business process validation the latter of which we can’t do..

David Chadwick: I totally agree that we’re only talking about verification and not about validation. This has come up in the presentation exchange group – which is that one of the components is that you can check the policy before checking any proof. I am strongly for always checking a proof before checking any policy..

Manu Sporny: +1 to what DavidC just said – check the signature first before doing any processing..

David Chadwick: Proof checking should be the number 1 to lower the attack surface..

1.6. Fixing problems identified through using the 1.0 and 1.1 specs must be in scope (issue vc-wg-charter#22)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#22.

Brent Zundel: I created a PR and merged it. It adds a single line about adding errata to make that in scope..
… I assert #22 can be closed. Any objection?.

Manu Sporny: +1, agree the PR fixed the issue..

Brent Zundel: Not hearing objections, only support..
… Closing it..

1.7. Standardization of Multilingual Support (issue vc-wg-charter#19)

See github issue vc-wg-charter#19.

Brent Zundel: Final issue for today is #19. Standardization of multilingual support..
… There’s a recent conversation..
… Shigeya made some new comments..
… It’s still not exactly clear what he’s looking for regarding changes to the charter..

Ivan Herman: I scanned through what he wrote to try to understand it. He gave some answer there. I think the idea … first of all is that what he says is JSON-LD is great and it works and there is no problem there. The example he has, for others who may not have ready it… if you take an environment on iOS/Android….
… There are standard ways to handle localizations of applications where the translation of terms are not built into the system but are stored in some well-agreed place and the app can use that to translate and localize..
… There seems to be some formats there and Shigeya is just asking to look into that mechanism and incorporate into VC. I’m not saying I understand all the technical details there but essentially making the translations of a VC instance and using some system features rather than build in what JSON-LD does..

Manu Sporny: My read is the exact same, I think, as Ivan’s. It’s a super interesting way of solving the problem. My expectation is that it would result in the VC data model called like “translation file” and we’d have to figure out if we use content hashes there. I’d say that whole discussion falls into the VC 2.0 work..
… We should discuss it. We have the ability to have the discussions because the 2.0 work is contemplating new features that people feel are needed in the ecosystem and this is one of those..

David Chadwick: This is an issue we’re already discussing in our company as well and it’s timely. I wonder if we can put into the scope of the next WG to consider internationalization and maybe outside of the scope of JSON-LD.

Kevin Dean: I’d very much like to see that, this is for everyone, not just the English-speaking world..

Charles Lehner: I wonder if JSON-LD context files and framing could be helpful here, but I’m not sure how that would translate to JWT..

Ivan Herman: Maybe to answer Charles, my feeling is that the answer is that it is very different. I think the idea is not to localize the terms we use within the VC in the vocab, whatever is in the context, but it’s more whatever has effectual meaning should be localized when you display things..
… It’s more to do maybe with the user interface for the VC than the VC itself..

Manu Sporny: Agree with Ivan..

Ivan Herman: The only thing we should do at this point is to ask Shigeya to give us a very specific PR or comment into the charter text and that’s it. I think we clearly agree that something like that is important..
… He should help us formalize it..

Charles Lehner: thanks.

Brent Zundel: So it sounds like we need to make sure that Shigeya knows we are in support of these ideas and we are looking forward to a PR to the charter to bring it into scope..

1.8. charter review admin.

Ivan Herman: So, I’m wondering about … its administrative. For the time being, we’re doing this discussion about the charter somewhat under the radar. We have suspended the process and haven’t formally announced to the AC and we’ve said this isn’t the formal vote and we haven’t done this step..
… I don’t know how long we should and can keep this under the radar status. If I am on a team, as soon as my team is used for a rechartering exercise I need to report it back to the AC..

Manu Sporny: I think we should pass this charter by the organizations through the W3C that statistically object to charters the most – and we have that data now..

Manu Sporny: This highlights the organizations that statistically object to charters the most at W3C: https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Member/w3c-ac-forum/2021OctDec/0179.html.

Manu Sporny: We want feed back on potential formal objections..
… We should say we’re going to put this out very soon and we want to know if people will formally object so we can have those discussions..

Ivan Herman: At this point they would not and could not object to the charter. I’m not sure that’s the right way to do it, the next step is to inform the AC we’re working on this and it’s information for the membership as a whole..
… I may misunderstand you – but if you’re saying before we do this we contact them and my feeling is the opposite. We publish on the AC forum and then we can of course, based on that, reach out to specific companies..

Manu Sporny: Agree with Ivan on his steps… but then reach out directly..

Manu Sporny: I agree with your steps, Ivan. I do think that we have this data now, we should just reach out..

Ivan Herman: I am fine with that once we are sort of public with this..

Manu Sporny: I think the question you’re asking about is about timeline. Do we wait for DID FOs to be done or do it in parallel?.

Ivan Herman: My problem is that this community is relatively small, e.g., David and Kevin are the only members on today’s call that aren’t members of the DID WG – and none of you others can clone themselves, so having the two WGs in parallel is a problem. So we have a dependency based on people available..
… That being said, the community knowing about it is more valuable than keeping it secret. Doing it before Christmas doesn’t make any sense, but we should probably do it in January if we decide to do it..

Manu Sporny: Agree with Ivan (again)..

Brent Zundel: Ok, we can craft something saying we’re working on this and send that out in January and then we can make sure to reach out to specific companies to get feedback at their earliest convenience..

Manu Sporny: I suggest we do it in early January, not late. The announcement to the AC that a charter is in progress that is..

Ivan Herman: I had a text that I was thinking about sending to the AC – I can send it to you, Brent, and you and Wayne and I can agree on a draft from there..

2. Review PRs.

Brent Zundel: https://github.com/w3c/vc-data-model/pulls?q=is%3Apr+is%3Aopen+label%3A%22v1.1+%28editorial%29%22+sort%3Aupdated-asc.

2.1. Add ecosystem support work for mDL. (pr vc-wg-charter#31)

See github pull request vc-wg-charter#31.

Manu Sporny: The text is terrible, I think it needs to be updated. What I think we’re trying to express here is that, in a non-normative way, the WG would like to give some kind of concrete guidance on things that happen during the lifetime of the WG..
… For example, how do we achieve real interop with ISO mDL – that’s something that we can write about, create test suites around and do work around, if there are people that are willing to do that work in the WG. It’s helpful to say we are getting to the point where we care about market vertical interop happening..
… And we may decide to pick some of that up during the WG if we can help interop. That’s the intent of the line item, it’s just really long. I tried to make it about VC data models and implementation guidance in support of market vertical interop and give an example of mDL..

Brent Zundel: We’ll be covering Manu’s charter PR and then go into the VC data model PRs..
… Any feedback for Manu on this addition to the charter right now?.
… Unless someone wants to add themselves to the queue right now we’re going to skip the subtitle one..

2.2. add section to differentiate between contexts and credential Schemas (pr vc-data-model#847)

See github pull request vc-data-model#847.

Brent Zundel: Raised by Kyle, adding a section to differentiate between contexts and credential schemas. This adds a section to the informative appendix that says here’s the base context and some text around what the difference is between a context and a schema..

David Chadwick: I haven’t read it yet, apologies..

Brent Zundel: No worries, it’s only been a couple of days, everyone read it and give feedback..

Manu Sporny: I think it’s a good thing to put in the spec and it’s purely editorial..

Brent Zundel: It looked good to me on my first glance through as well. I encourage folks to give feedback on that one..

2.3. Add clarification about verifiability (pr vc-data-model#829)

See github pull request vc-data-model#829.

Brent Zundel: Clarification on verifiability. This has had some back and forth for a little while. I believe all the requested changes have been addressed at this point. Charles, can you give a current status on this PR?.

Charles Lehner: Sure, I believe I have addressed the changes requested. I added an additional part to link to the evidence section. It’s in a normative section, but it’s just making it into a term definition, that’s all..

Brent Zundel: Any other feedback? Several approvals … it seems like something we could merge now..
… Any opposition to merging now? Plenty of time to review and respond to it..
… Hearing no objections. I’ll leave that to you to do, Manu..
… That’s the PRs. We have 13 minutes left so we might actually touch on some issues today..

3. Triage Issues.

Brent Zundel: https://github.com/w3c/vc-data-model/issues?q=is%3Aopen+is%3Aissue+-label%3Av2.0+-label%3A%22v1.1+%28editorial%29%22+sort%3Aupdated-asc.

Brent Zundel: I believe we have one issue to triage today..
… We’re looking to determine if this is v1.1 or v2.0..

3.1. clarify what an “appropriate VC/VP” is (issue vc-data-model#848)

See github issue vc-data-model#848.

Brent Zundel: Clarify what an appropriate VC/VP is. The type information is used to determine if a provided VC/VP is appropriate. The issue is looking for clarification on what appropriate means..

Manu Sporny: Should be 1.1 editorial..

Dave Longley: +1 to editorial 1.1.

Brent Zundel: Does anyone in the group want to have themselves assigned to do a PR to add text?.

David Chadwick: I’ll do it..

Charles Lehner: Thanks, I was just wondering regarding about PRs #829 / #751 … I’m wondering how to hear back..

Manu Sporny: We will ping the person and ask if our merge addressed their concern..

Charles Lehner: Ok..

4. v1.1 Issues.

Brent Zundel: https://github.com/w3c/vc-data-model/issues?q=is%3Aopen+is%3Aissue+label%3A%22v1.1+%28editorial%29%22+sort%3Aupdated-asc.

4.1. Optimized SVG diagrams (issue vc-data-model#721)

See github issue vc-data-model#721.

Manu Sporny: I just requested as status update from Dave Lehn on that one..

4.2. Fix the JWT encoding in the examples (issue vc-data-model#838)

See github issue vc-data-model#838.

Brent Zundel: Manu raised this – can you give an update?.

Manu Sporny: I did this, but I still haven’t applied David Chadwick’s request for a comment about using one JWT mechanism over the other. I’ll put an update in here, it’s not done yet, it will be when I implement David’s request..

4.3. Have fields for locale-specific information (names, addresses, etc.) been checked? (issue vc-data-model#734)

See github issue vc-data-model#734.

Brent Zundel: Have fields for locale-specific information been checked … assigned to Dmitri. It seems once a month we talk about this. I’m not sure anything’s happening to move it forward..
… We’ll send another ping to Dmitri..

Ivan Herman: So, I am not even sure I understand what it being asked. I realize addresses are very different from one place to another. If I take a VC with names and addresses … those vocabs are external vocabs and the VC is just the framework. If I’m well informed. This WG, I don’t think this WG can do anything here..

Kevin Dean: I would agree with that. GS1 went through a long and tedious process standardizing address for international shipping purposes. It’s not our job to do that sort of thing in this group..

Manu Sporny: Same..

David Chadwick: Is it correct that the examples are non-normative. So then – that sort of resolves the issue in a way? If we just say these are non-normative examples?.

Ted Thibodeau Jr.: Yeah, I think that they weren’t looking to see if this was in scope for us, it’s just something that caught their eye and the examples are broken into, I think, US normative formats. If we just use name and address and nothing else it’s easy to fix..

Brent Zundel: I believe the fix we settled on was to alter the examples to make them more general..
… Beyond that I don’t think we needed to do anything..

Ted Thibodeau Jr.: I don’t think that this flag was about us changing vocabs in any way. Internationalization looks at things that are normally i18n concerns and if we make the examples more generic they become non-concerns..

Ivan Herman: I don’t disagree with anything said, but I think Addison and Richard deserve an explicit answer and we say it’s not the WG’s job to do the vocab parts..

Manu Sporny: I’m scanning through the entire spec for where we use addresses. We have one example in C6 where a holder is using a non-i18n address field and we can fix that. We have been using schema.org because we know it has been through a massive i18n effort..
… One example is a good example, another is not. We’ll tell them that we’ll fix the bad one and clarify that we don’t work on address formats in the group..

Ivan Herman: +1 to manu.

Brent Zundel: We are still looking to Dmitri to raise a PR to fix that one example..
… Any other opinions?.

5. AOB.

Brent Zundel: Ok, very last question: I still plan on holding a meeting next Wednesday, but not meeting after that until January. Are folks planning on being into the swing of things on the 5th or should we do the 12th?.

Manu Sporny: Hold off until the 12th please :).

Ryan Grant: 12th.

Brent Zundel: Ok, we will hold off until the 12th, see you next week..
… Thanks to the scribe and to everyone for all your efforts..