Subject: SC22 N2551 - Draft SC22 Business Plan - PLENARY ACTION ITEM

From: "william c. rinehuls" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 16:49:08 -0400 (EDT)

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

ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22
N2551

August 1997

TITLE:
Draft JTC 1/SC22 Business Plan

SOURCE:
Secretariat, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22

WORK ITEM:
N/A

STATUS:
Please note that this Business Plan will be considered under Agenda Item
11.7 at the AUgust 1997 SC22 Plenary.

CROSS REFERENCE:
N/A

DOCUMENT TYPE:
Draft Business Plan

ACTION:
To SC22 Member Bodies for review.

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

___________________ end of title page; beginning of draft plan _________

TO:    SC22

SUBJECT:  Business Plan for JTC 1/SC22

Following is my draft of an SC22 Business Plan for discussion at next
week's plenary under agenda item 11.7.  I have left in brackets the
explanations of each item in the plan, but will delete them in the final
copy.  Note that I have no text for the last item; I would like help from
the plenary to determine priorities.

Robert H. Follett
Chairman, JTC 1/SC22

  ********************  Draft Business Plan Follows  ********************

[Note:  All items in brackets should be deleted before submission.] 
 
BUSINESS PLAN FOR JTC 1/SC22, Programming Languages, their Environments, and System 
Software Interfaces
 
[Note:  Currently missing reports from WG3 and WG4] 

PERIOD COVERED:  December 1996  -  September 1997 

SUBMITTED BY:  Robert H. Follett, Chairman

1.  MANAGEMENT SUMMARY: 

1.1   JTC 1/SC22 STATEMENT OF SCOPE:

Standardization of programming languages, their environments and systems
software interfaces such as: 
  *	specification techniques; and
  * common facilities and interfaces.  Excluded:  specialized languages or
environments assigned to the program of work of another Subcommittee or
Technical Committee

1.2   PROJECT REPORT 

SC22 has at total of 53 assigned projects which, after subdivisions,
result in 94 identifiable items of work (projects and subprojects).  Of
these, 53 are currently active in development and 41 are published
standards, technical reports and amendments that are in maintenance mode. 
None are planned for withdrawal at this time. 

The SC22 Secretariat's report contains a complete listing of these
projects and related target dates. 

1.3 COOPERATION AND COMPETITION

[Included here an analysis of the key players in the area pertaining to
JTC 1 or its SC, in order to highlight any possibility for cooperation
with other JTC 1 SC’s, ISO TC’s or Industry Consortia/Fora.  Also indicate
agreed division of work or opportunities for projects of a complimentary
nature. Identification of standards initiatives or de-facto standards
shall be made that may be in direct competition with some of the
projects.]

Ada (WG9):
 There are two major professional societies in this area: the Special
Interest Group on Ada (SIG) of the Association for Computing Machinery and
Ada-Europe.  The semi-annual meetings of WG9 are scheduled to coincide
with the major conferences organized by these two groups. Informal but
close cooperation with SIGAda is maintained by the convener.  The UK Head
of Delegation to WG9 is also an officer of Ada-Europe. 

There is one major vendor consortium, the Ada Resource Association (ARA). 
Formal liaison with ARA is maintained.  WG9 is looking for opportunities
to transpose de facto standards from the ARA.  The United States
Department of Defense (DOD), Ada Joint Program Office (AJPO) has a
continuing interest in the Ada language.  Liaison is assured because AJPO
funds the convener to serve in his position.  In addition, liaison and/or
consultation are applied as appropriate with WG4 (Cobol), WG11
(Language-Independent Standards), WG14 (C Language), WG15 (POSIX), WG16
(LISP), WG21 (C++), SC21/WG3 (IRDS), the SC22 Java Study Group, and the
IEEE Computer Society Software Engineering Standards Committee. 

C (WG14):
 Where appropriate, WG14 has established active liaisons with other SC22
working groups. 

C++ (WG21):  
 WG 21 has liaisons with other SC22 working groups on C, POSIX and
Internationalization.  With regard to the latter, it is using the WG20
guidelines on extended characters.  It also takes account of the
recommendations from WG11 on cross-language standards. 

Fortran (WG5):
 WG5 cooperates closely with the ANSI NCITS/J3 Fortran Technical
Committee, to whom it has delegated the technical development of Fortran
2000 as well as the maintenance of Fortran 95 (IS 1539-1:1997).  There is
also close contact with the industry-driven High Performance Fortran
Consortium, with many members of the HPF Consortium also being members of
J3 and/or WG5. Many of those responsible for the development of commercial
Fortran compilers are members of J3 and/or WG5.  Other important liaisons
are those with IFIP WG2.5 (Numerical Software) and ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG20
(Internationalization). 

Internationalization (WG20):  
 WG20 works closely with CEN/TC304 which is developing an ordering
standard for European languages and also developed ENV 12005 which is
similar to CD 14652 on cultural conventions, but is limited to European
conventions. 

Language Independent Projects (WG11):
 The WG11 documents are mainly produced to be used by other programming
language committees.  Therefore, WG11 maintains liaisons with many of the
SC22 WGs. 

Lisp (WG16):
 The WG16 activities that produced ISLISP were done by collaborative work
of six regularly participating P-member nations; France (Convenor), United
States (Project Editor), Canada, Germany, Japan, and United Kingdom. These
nations had close collaboration with their local Lisp communities; for
example, EuLisp community in European nations, X3J13 in United States, and
IPSJ-SIGSYM community in Japan.  The ISLISP design reflected the
experiences of COMMON LISP, EULISP, LE LISP, and SCHEME, and took into
account common practices in the Lisp community.  ISLISP is a small Lisp,
but it is designed with extensibility in mind, trying also to keep
compatibility with existing Lisp dialects.  ISO/IEC ISLISP, ANSI COMMON
LISP and ANSI/IEEE SCHEME are co-existing and complementary in the Lisp
community, since they have their own distinctive features in languages,
systems, and applications. 

Modula-2 (WG13):
 WG13 cooperates with as many compiler writers as possible, and contacts
with industry work quite well.  Where appropriate, WG13 has established
contact with other SC22 working groups.

PCTE (WG22):
 The most active liaisons maintained by WG22 have been with ECMA/TC33,
where most WG22 members are also ECMA/TC33 members, and with ISO/IEC
SC7/WG11.  In the latter case, the WG22 liaison in SC7/WG11 is the project
editor of the subproject dealing with the definition of rules to derive
PCTE Schema Definition Sets from the standard models adopted by WG11
(basically CDIF models). 

POSIX (WG15):
 WG15's work is done with close cooperation of The Open Group (TOG, aka
X/Open), Usenix, Europen, and other UNIX organizations.  The bulk of
development for work brought into WG15 has been done in cooperation with
IEEE's Portable Applications Standards Committee.  TOG is a category "C"
liaison, and authorized to submit PAS specifications in areas relevant to
WG15's work.  While most "UNIX"  type systems conform to the
specifications from WG15 (POSIX), there is significant competition from
de-facto standards, typically "Windows 95" and "NT". 

Prolog (WG17):
 WG17 cooperates with the whole Prolog community.  Where appropriate, WG17
has established contact with other SC22 working groups.

VDM-SL (WG19):
 The VDM group involves collaborative work of six participating P-members: 
UK, Denmark, Holland, France, Japan and the USA.  The VDM-SL
standardization work was also supported by the EU by various grants. 

Z Notation (WG19):
 The work of the Z group involves the participation of members from the
UK, USA, Australia, Japan, Germany, France, Italy, Brazil, Canada, and
Ireland. Members are drawn from industry, government, and universities. 
The Z standardization work has been assisted by grants from industrial and
government agencies in the USA and Europe. 

2.0   PERIOD REVIEW 
  
[This is the report from the chair of JTC 1 and or one of it’s SC’s
highlighting project progress, special considerations and or needs which
were or were not met. This is where generic or specific comment from the
chair is to be made highlighting special items requiring visibility and
action.  The review shall focus on the following elements: ]
 
2.1  MARKET REQUIREMENTS,  
   [Identification of key market trends, needs (anticipatory standards or       
   voids) and determining factors for JTC1’s success in this area.  ]

SC22 standards are produced in response to market requirements covering
extensive and diverse areas of the marketplace.  While press attention is
primarily devoted to newer language and interface areas, it is important
not to overlook the importance of older technologies where there is
significant user investment.  Adding current technological capabilities to
older programming languages can provide important economic benefits to
current users.  Some specifics on market requirements in particular SC22
areas follow. 

Ada:  
 The most fundamental change in the market has been action by the US
Department of Defense (DOD) to drop its "mandate" of Ada in all military
systems.  The choice of language to be used will now be made by each
individual development program.  Certain segments of the DOD remain
committed to favoring Ada, notably the real-time, embedded systems
community.  DOD has committed to increase funding to support the
activities of the Ada Joint Program Office. 

C: 
 The revision to ISO/IEC 9899 is in response to user community pressure
and to implementers concerns to keep current with today's programming
trends and market. The working group believes that evolution of Object
Oriented programming, numerical extensions that were proposed by the US
committee, internationalization, advancements in character set
standardization, cross-language standards and cross-language bindings all
need to be considered in the revised standard.  Most of these issues where
not considered during the technical discussions for the current ISO C
Standard.

C++: 
 More than one million people are estimated to be programming in C++. 
This marketplace is very eager for the C++ international standard to be
completed.

Fortran: 
 Fortran is still the language of choice for the majority of scientific
and technological programming.  There are now signs of growing use of
Fortran 90, and the recent introduction of two commercial subsets designed
for educational use is generating increased interest in Fortran from the
higher education sector.  This growth in interest means that it is
important that the development of the language can react quickly to market
requirements, while still ensuring that the safeguards of full
international review are maintained.  (See Strategies below.) 

One perceived market requirement is for a form of conditional compilation
to simplify the transfer of programs between many platforms. This is being
processed as an additional Part of the Fortran Standard, as it is not
currently intended that it should be a requirement for all
Standard-conforming compilers.  It is expected that the draft CD will be
submitted for its first approval ballot later this year.

WG5 has developed a database of requirements for future versions of
Fortran during the last five years since the publication of Fortran 90,
and this formed the basis of a year-long analysis of the features which
should be added to the base language in the next revision, informally
known as Fortran 2000. 

Internationalization: 
 With the proliferation of PCs and the emergence of the world wide web,
internationalization has become a very important factor in the creation of
programs and thus in programming languages.

Language Independent Projects: 
 The market requirement for these standards is more indirect than
explicit.  Several ISO/IEC standards make reference to these documents and
they are useful in promoting commonality and interoperability among these
standards.

LISP: 
 The working group has investigated several areas, e.g., modules,
internationalization, graphics, and binding facilities, and has taken into
consideration several contributions from member bodies.  None had
sufficient maturity for inclusion into the ISLISP standard published this
year.  Some of them, in particular a C language binding, should be
included in a subsequent revision. 

Modula-2: 
 Strong market demands from the Modula-2 community have resulted in the
development of additional parts to the base standard.  There was popular
demand for Object Oriented Extensions and we anticipate that the current
development of Part 3 will lead to a uniform way of handling these
extensions in available compilers.  There was popular demand mainly from
academia for Generics which was met with Part 2.  Finally, the requirement
for interfacing to libraries in the C language is being handled by the
development of a Type 3 Technical Report.

PCTE: 
 The PCTE market is a subset of the Repository market.  Today, PCTE
addresses well the problem of providing a standard framework upon which
complete repository products can be built.  Like in many other domains of
the software industry, the approval of a standard at the ISO level is not
sufficient to make it universally adopted.  A major condition for its
acceptance in the industry is the wide availability of implementations
compliant with this standard.  Today this criteria is only partly met; 
there are available implementations but they have not yet managed to be
the leading technology on this market.  In fact, there is still no leading
technology as large software vendors seem to still believe in proprietary
solutions in this domain and compete against each other without adhering
to standards.
 
The repository market is relatively small.  There is the same ratio
between the market of databases in general and the market of
repositories,as between the market of end user applications and the market
of software development tools.  The relatively small size of this market
makes the adoption of PCTE technology grow slowly. Nevertheless, despite
this aspect, the need for repositories is now fully recognised and most
software development organisations are now convinced that they need a
repository.  PCTE based repository products are currently used at more
than 100 different sites in Europe, America and Asia (principally Japan). 

POSIX: 
 Conformance to POSIX standards is taken for granted by a wide variety of
private and public sector users for "UNIX" systems procurement. All major
implementations of "UNIX" claim conformance to the POSIX standards. 

Prolog: 
 The only market requirement beyond the base standard identified by the
Prolog user community is the definition of a module facility.  This is
being developed as Part 2 of the standard. 

VDM-SL: 
 The increase in the need for safety-critical systems will imply increased
interest in formal languages.  Regarding VDM-SL in particular,
requirements have been identified for some sort of modularization and for
addition of an object oriented structure to the language.  In the latter
area, a European group is working in this area and incorporation of this
work may expedite the production of Part 2 of the standard.

Z Notation: 
 The increasing interest in safety-critical systems and in secure systems
suggests a continuing interest in the use of Z notation. Industrial users
of the Z notation continue to exert pressure for a standard and are
contributing participants to the development work. 

2.2  ACHIEVEMENTS, 
 [  Highlight accomplishments reference work program, target dates,  
   corrective action and special circumstances. . ]
 
  * Ada:  DIS ballots completed on two additional Ada packages; 
  * C:  CD Registration of the revision to IS 9899 on C; 
  * C++:  Completion of the Final CD 14882 ballot on C++. 
  * Fortran:  The latest revision of the Fortran standard has been
approved and is being published;
  * Internationalization:  TR 11017 on the Framework for
Internationalization has been forwarded for publication;
  * Internationalization:  The first CD 14651 on International String
Ordering has been completed;
  * Internationalization:  Concurrent Registration and CD 14652 ballot
circulated for Specification of Cultural Conventions; 
  * Internationalization:  Completion of DTR 10176 ballot adding
internationalization issues to the TR on Guidlines for the Preparation of
Programming Language Standards. 
  * LISP:  Publication of IS 13816 on ISLISP; 
  * Modula-2:  Parts 2 and 3 of the Modula-2 standard, IS 10514,
progressed to the DIS stage; 
  * PCTE:  Amendments for object-oriented extensions and fine grain
objects for all three parts of IS 13719 on PCTE have been forwarded for
publication; 
  * POSIX:  Registration of amendments to POSIX Part 1, IS 9945-1, for
realtime extensions; 
  * POSIX:  DIS 15068-2 on POSIX Software Administration approved; 
  * POSIX:  Final CD ballot circulated for revision of IS 13210 on
Requirements and Guidelines for Test Methods Specifications and Test
Method Implementations for Measuring Conformance to POSIX Standards;  *
Prolog:  CD Ballot completed on Part 2 of IS 13211 on Prolog; 

2.3  RESOURCES  
[   Status of resource availability/commitment and the impact on projects,     
   completion dates and priorities for the new work period. ]
  
It is increasingly difficult for standards participants to obtain the
necessary funding for standards development activities.  Nonetheless, all
currently active SC22 projects continue to have sufficient support. 

3.0  FOCUS NEXT WORK PERIOD  

[An identification of the direction and focus for the new work period  
leading up to the next plenary session. This section shall include  
information on following elements. ]

3.1  DELIVERABLES: 

[This shall indicate specific deliverables expected in the work period on
a project level.  Note that this work period will be from September 1997
through May 1998 since the next JTC1 plenary is the first week in June
1998. ]
  
  * Ada:  Final approval of DIS 13813 and DIS 13814 on Ada packages; 
  * C:  Circulation of a CD ballot on the revision to IS 9899 on C; 
  * C++:  Circulation of FDIS 14882 on C++. 
  * Fortran:  Completion of work on the Fortran Type 2 Technical Reports; 
  * Fortran:  Final CD ballot on Fortran Part 2, Varying length character
strings; 
  * Internationalization:  Circulation of Final CD 14651 ballot on
International String Ordering; 
  * Internationalization:  Registration and completion of first CD 14652
ballot on Specification of Cultural Conventions; 
  * Internationalization:  TR 10176 ballot on a revision to Guidlines for
the Preparation of Programming Language Standards, adding
internationalization issues to the TR; 
  * Language Independent:  Progression of Part 2 of IS 10967 on Language
Independent Arithmetic: Elementary Numerical Functions to the DIS level; 
  * Language Independent:  Circulation of a PDTR ballot on Guidelines for
Language Independent Service Specifications; 
  * Modula-2:  Approval and publication of Part 2 and Part 3 of IS 10967
on Modula-2; 
  * PCTE:  Completion of work on all four parts of IS 13719 on PCTE,
including production of a new edition incorporating all amendments and
corrections; 
  * POSIX:  Completion of PDAM ballot on amendments to POSIX Part 1, IS
9945-1, for extensions to the base and for realtime extensions; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of DAM ballot on amendment to POSIX Part 1, IS
9945-1, for Protocol Independent Interfaces; 
  * POSIX:  Completion of PDAM ballot on additional utilities for IS
9945-2, Shell and Utillities for POSIX; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of DIS ballot on Part 3 to IS 15068, POSIX System
Administration: User & Group Account Management; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of FCD ballot on Part 4 to IS 15068 POSIX System
Administration: Printing Interfaces; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of FDIS ballot for revision of IS 13210 on
Requirements and Guidelines for Test Methods Specifications and Test
Method Implementations for Measuring Conformance to POSIX Standards; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of PDAM 1 to IS 14515-1 on Realtime Extensions to
the POSIX System Interface Test Methods; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of PDISP ballot on POSIX Supercomputing
Applications Environment Profile; 
  * POSIX:  Circulation of PDISP ballot on POSIX Real Time Application
Support Profile; 
  * Prolog:  Circulation of Final CD Ballot on Part 2 of IS 13211 on
Prolog; 
  * Z Notation:  Circulation of a CD 13568 ballot on Z Notation; 

3.2  STRATEGIES: 

[A statement or statements related to strategic approaches required to  
accomplish goals and objectives. ]
 
An important SC22 strategy is to use a variety of development methods in
order to produce timely standards and make the most efficient use of
standards development resources.  SC22 has used the following methods: 
	a)  Assignment of development responsibility to a National Body
with a strong development committee, with a requirement for appropriate
synchronization of the international and national comment processes so
that all comments are appropriately considered in the production of the
standard; 
	b)  Joint or co-located meetings of SC22 WGs with NB or liaison
organization development committees working in the same area, to produce
standards with identical text; 
	c)  Invitation to NB or liaison organizations to fast-track
documents in the area of SC22 responsibility; 
	d)  Development within traditional working groups. 

The SC22 Working Group on Fortran is implementing a strategy allowing it
to react effectively to new requirements without causing unacceptable
delay to the processing of the main Standard.  Certain high priority new
features which were too late to be included in the last revision are being
processed as Type 2 Technical Reports, with a guarantee that the feature
will be incorporated unaltered in the next revision of the base Standard
unless experience in implementation or use shows that a modification is
necessary.  The intent of this procedure is to encourage implementors to
add these features to their compilers without waiting for the next
revision of the main language Standard.  Two such TRs are about to be
submitted for their final DTR approval ballots, while a third is currently
in the process of being balloted for PDTR approval. 

  3.2.1   RISKS  

    [  A definition of potential risk(s) involved with the strategy and the  
      impact to the project or JTC 1. Risk(s) shall be defined for each  
      strategy to be employed/included. ]
 
The risks associated with all the above methods are: 
	a)  Continuing commitment of participants and their sponsors
throughout the development process, especially in a time of organizational
downsizing; 
	b)  Continuing commitment of sufficient National Bodies where the
development work is done within WGs.  This risk is significantly reduced
when development is done outside a WG; 
	c)  Dependence on other organizations for technical expertise,
development work, and project editing when development is done outside a
WG; 
	d)  Obtaining consensus when conflicting implementations have been
produced prior to the development of the standard. 

  3.2.2   OPPORTUNITIES 

   [   An explanation of the related opportunity(s) afforded by the strategy  
      and or envisioned due to trends and market developments. ]
 
Extensive use of electronic distribution techniques provides an
opportunity to speed up the development process and reduce the requirement
for as many meetings that add considerable expense to standards
development participation. 

3.3  WORK PROGRAM PRIORITIES  

[Based on the scope, market needs, strategies, resource availability and  
status of existing projects, provide an overview of the work program  
priorities in capsule form.  This should be as generic as possible with  
rationale provided to support the determination by the group involved.   ]
  
???

  ********************  End of Draft Business Plan  ********************

__________________________ end of SC22 N2551 _____________________