Subject: Document SC22 N2320 (SC22 Chairman's Report to JTC1)

From: "william c. rinehuls" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 16:50:55 -0400 (EDT)

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ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22
Programming languages, their environments and system software interfaces
Secretariat:  U.S.A.  (ANSI)

ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22
N2320

November 1996

TITLE:             SC22 Chairman's Report for the December 1996
                   ISO/IEC JTC 1 Plenary

SOURCE:            Secretariat, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22

WORK ITEM:         N/A

STATUS:            N/A

CROSS REFERENCE:   N/A

DOCUMENT TYPE:     Chairman's Report

ACTION:            To SC22 Member Bodies, WG Conveners and HODs for 
                   information.

Address reply to:
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22 Secretariat
William C. Rinehuls
8457 Rushing Creek Court
Springfield, VA USA 22153
Tel:  +1 (703) 912-9680
Fax:  +1 (703) 912-2973
email:  [email-masked]. net

________________end of title page, beginning of text _________________

ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22
Programming languages, their environments and system software interfaces
Secretariat:  U.S.A.  (ANSI)

Subcommittee 22 Chairman's Report
on the JTC 1/SC 22 Plenary Meeting
23-27 September 1996

The ninth plenary meeting of JTC 1 Subcommittee 22 was held 23-27
September 1996 in London, United Kingdom, twelve months after our previous
plenary.  This report will summarize the results of that meeting. 

We had a very successful meeting.  Twelve National Bodies were
represented.  All fourteen of our working group conveners were either
present or represented at the meeting, which, as usual, contributed
significantly to the success of the meeting.  The plenary adopted 46
resolutions, not including those expressing appreciation.  All were
adopted unanimously. 

SC 22 took note of the increasing interest in Java-related technology and
initiated a study period to investigate standardization in this area.  We
established a study group with Dr. Bob Mathis as convener to coordinate
this study.  We anticipate that the first meeting will be held in early
January, 1997, and be co-located with a meeting of SC 29/WG 12 whose MHEG
work is also related to Java. 

SC 22 held an ad hoc session during the plenary to discuss the progress of
the JTC 1 Ad Hoc Group on JTC 1 Strategy for Implementing Information
Technology.  Two documents were developed and subsequently approved for
submission to the Ad Hoc meeting the week following our plenary.  One, SC
22 Recommendations on JTC 1's Implementation of IT (JTC 1 N 4238),
contained a number of specific suggestions regarding the JTC 1 Policy on
Electronic Document Distribution and the Draft Transition Plan.  The
other, SC 22 Recommendations on the ISO/IEC Electronic Distribution and
Copyright Policy (JTC 1 N 4239), strongly urged JTC 1 to request ISO and
IEC to exempt JTC 1 and its subsidiary bodies from both electronic
distribution restrictions and the recent change to the established
copyright policy.  Regarding the latter, SC 22 believes that this change
will severely impact the willingness of organizations to contribute
technology and specifications and to participate in JTC 1 standardization. 
I was authorized to represent SC 22 at the JTC 1 Ad Hoc meeting. 

SC 22's implementation of electronic document distribution is proceeding
well.  Short documents are being distributed by email to eleven National
Bodies and almost all of our working group conveners.  Seven NBs and most
conveners have agreed to accept larger documents by ftp and a few draft
standards documents have been made available in this way.  In view of the
restrictive ISO/IEC policy, we are grateful for the offer from Mr. Keld
Simonsen of Denmark to set up a uniform ftp site with appropriate access
controls for future SC 22 documents.  The SC 22 World Wide Web page has
been active for about a year and we currently have hot links to more
detailed pages prepared by eight of our fourteen working groups.  SC 22
approved a request to JTC 1 to obtain permission for our working group on
the C language to place two Technical Corrigenda and two Record of
Responses documents regarding ISO/IEC 9899 on its publicly accessible web
page. 

SC 22 conducted a management review of all projects and subprojects,
having received input from most of the National Bodies active in our
projects.  We forwarded the results of this review to the JTC 1 Ad Hoc on
Re-engineering (see JTC 1 N 4254).  Some projects have been recommended
for withdrawal, as noted in the SC 22 Secretariat's Report.  I should note
one in particular, the COBOL binding to FIMS, which has successfully
completed balloting; it is nevertheless recommended for withdrawal since
market interest in FIMS has virtually disappeared.  We examined those
projects that have exceeded the time limits specified in the JTC 1
Directives and passed resolutions extending the time where justified. 

SC 22 prepared a response to the survey on conformity assessment and
interoperability for forwarding to SWG-CA.  SC 22 also prepared a summary
of work items related to the Global Information Infrastructure for
submission to SWG-GII. 

Two NPs were approved for forwarding to JTC 1 for ballot.  One is on
Interfacing Modula-2 to C and the other on APIs for Internationalization. 
The latter NP is very similar to one submitted a year ago which failed due
to the lack of participation by five National Bodies who were P-members of
SC 22.  Since then, one interested NB has changed status from O-membership
to P-membership and another NB has said it would participate.  As a
result, we have strong indications that at least five National Bodies will
agree to participate this time. 

SC 22 agreed that the U.S. should submit for fast-track ballot an
amendment to ISO/IEC 14519, POSIX Ada Binding, with real time extensions. 
SC 22 also agreed that the ECMA-230 standard for an IDL binding to PCTE,
submitted for fast-track processing by ECMA, is suitable in content to
satisfy our project 22.47.5.  However, SC 22 noted that ECMA-230 is based
on CD 14750 for IDL rather than on DIS 14750 currently under DIS ballot. 
SC 22 therefore recommended that ECMA consider the result of the DIS 14750
ballot and confirm that ECMA-230 is still appropriate for binding to the
final international standard for IDL before the fast-track ballot is
circulated. 

During the past year, JTC 1 approved an NP for SC 22 to develop profiles
within its scope.  At this plenary, we created two subdivisions of this
project for development of ISPs relating to POSIX environments.  SC 22
also agreed to subdivide the POSIX C Binding project for an advanced real
time amendment and to subdivide the Fortran project for development of
Part 3 of ISO/IEC 1539 on conditional compilation in Fortran. 

SC 22 sent a liaison statement to SC 2 with comments on PDAM 9 to ISO/IEC
10646-1 regarding identifiers for characters.  SC 22 had requested this
work a year ago and we appreciate SC 2's attention to our request. 

During our review of the NP for the Architecture Neutral Distribution
Format (ANDF) submitted by SC 26, SC 22 was surprised to learn that a CD
ballot was already underway within SC 26 using the simultaneous NP and CD
ballot procedure.  There was no indication on the NP ballot that the
simultaneous procedure was being used.  SC 26 is aware of SC 22 interest
and indicated SC 22 on the NP for cooperation and liaison; however, SC 22
did not receive a copy of the CD document.  SC 22 passed a resolution
requesting SC 26 to send us a copy of the ANDF CD and to delay further
processing of the ANDF project until SC 22 has had an opportunity for
review and comment. 

Last year I reported the difficulty that we were having with the convener
of our working group 13 on Modula-2.  I am very pleased to report that the
working group is now completely on track, having recently published the
standard for the base language, with follow-on work well underway.  SC 22
is grateful to Mr. Kees Pronk of The Netherlands for stepping into a
difficult situation and acting as interim convener for the past year.  Mr.
Martin Schoenhacker of Austria has now been appointed as the new permanent
convener. 

Two other conveners, Dr. Bill Plauger of WG 14 (C language) and Dr. Sam
Harbison of WG 21 (C++ language) resigned as of this plenary.  SC 22
accepted the offer of the United States, which holds both secretariats,
for the nominations of Mr. John Benito for WG 14 and Dr. Thomas Plum for
WG 21.  Dr. Bob Mathis, convener of WG 9 (Ada), also announced his
intention to resign but agreed to continue until a new convener is
approved. 

Robert H. Follett
Chairman, JTC 1/SC 22

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