Project: Standardizing web infrastructure at the WHATWG. Primary focus will 
be getting the URL Standard to "80% done" (usually implies "80% to be done", 
but hopefully less).

Existing Work: http://wiki.whatwg.org/wiki/User:Annevk#Editing (Both 
"Active" and "Maintaining" are in scope for this project.)

Aim: To substantially improve the URL Standard and maintain other "Existing 
Work".

Plan: Address the following issues in order of appearance:

* Time: 1 * 40h
  Address the mutation observer-related bugs from the DOM Standard as they
  are problematic for new implementors, such as Opera and Microsoft. (The
  bugs are only present in the specification, not in the Gecko and WebKit
  implementations.)

* Time: 3 * 40h
  Finish http://url.spec.whatwg.org/#hosts-and-ip-addresses and write more
  extensively about the problems with the existing stack of incompatible
  standards. (This amount of time should help to put a solid stake in the 
  ground with respect to IDNA.)

* Time: 1 * 40h
  Define the javascript and about URL schemes. (In particular the post URL
  parser processing and whether or not they are conformant.)

* Time: 2 * 40h
  Define the API to manipulate parameters in the query component of a URL.
  (This requires a bunch of time because the model is not in place. So a 
  parser for the query component needs to be introduced that splits, it 
  needs to be serialized, and there's a bunch of conflicting feedback on 
  what the best API would be here.)

* Time: 1 * 40h
  Improve the API by adding new features to it mainly as manipulators for
  what is already defined in the model. E.g. toASCII and toUnicode for 
  domain names, and hooks for percent-encoding.

* Time: 1 * 40h
  Make the URL parser http://url.spec.whatwg.org/#parsing report conformance
  errors and add the ability to terminate processing if there is such an 
  error. (Most user agents have to be error-tolerant, but e.g. a validator
  does not have to be.)  

* Time: 1.5 * 40h
  Implement the URL parser including error recovery in JavaScript as an 
  update to an existing project of mine: https://github.com/annevk/url

* Time: 1.5 * 40h
  Work on tests.

The above is a rough outline. I am committed to work on this project 
fulltime for the next three months and will postpone any employment until
February.

Risks: 

* My estimates are ballpark figures. 
* IDNA largely depends on what other parties are planning on doing. I can 
  only guide that so much.
* Feedback on existing text likely results in additional work in that area.
  The above is a rough outline that does not factor in maintenance, but
  maintenance should not be a lot of work so it should even out.

Reporting: I will email a brief status update weekly.

Administrative: TBD.