From rinehuls@access.digex.net Wed Aug 13 23:02:31 1997 Received: from access5.digex.net (qlrhmEbBUV1EY@access5.digex.net [205.197.245.196]) by dkuug.dk (8.6.12/8.6.12) with ESMTP id XAA17178 for ; Wed, 13 Aug 1997 23:02:29 +0200 Received: from localhost (rinehuls@localhost) by access5.digex.net (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id RAA13807 for ; Wed, 13 Aug 1997 17:02:22 -0400 (EDT) Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 17:02:22 -0400 (EDT) From: "william c. rinehuls" To: sc22docs@dkuug.dk Subject: SC22 N2558 - SC2 Liaison Report - FOR PLENARY Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ___________________ 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 N2558 August 1997 TITLE: JTC 1/SC2 Liaison Report to JTC 1/SC22 SOURCE: Secretariat, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22 WORK ITEM: N/A STATUS: This Report will be considered under Agenda Item 7.4.1 at the August 1997 SC22 Plenary CROSS REFERENCE: N/A DOCUMENT TYPE: SC2 Liaison Report ACTION: To SC22 Member Bodies for information. 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: rinehuls@access.digex.net ______________________ end of title page; beginning of report ________ J. W. van WINGEN 1997-08-13 VERSION 1.0 REPORT OF THE LIAISON REPRESENTATIVE OF SC22 TO SC2 To SC22 Plenary meeting, Ottawa, Canada, 18-23 August 1997 ISO/IEC JTC1/SC2, Coded character sets, had its 1997 Plenary meeting 07-08 July in Iraklion on Crete, Greece, preceded by meetings of its two WGs. There were 23 NBs represented (some only at the WG meetings) and a varying number of delegates (35-40). A Liaison Report from SC22 was read (SC2 N 2904). SC2 underwent important changes since its previous plenary. ECMA, acting for Switzerland, has given up the Secretariat, end of 1996, the position of Chairman and Secretary then being vacant. Applications were invited by JTC1, the period ending (extended by urgent request) on 15 September 1996. Japan remained the only candidate, and JTC1 decided accordingly. The new SC2 Chairman will be Professor Shibano, and the new Secretary Ms. Kimura. The new WG3 convener is Mr. Melagrakis from Greece. Also ECMA wanted to transfer the Registration Authority for ISO 2375 and 7350 it helds to another body. SC2 agreed to recommend JTC1 to transfer these to Japan. SC2 is busily revising its standards. Of the 10 parts of ISO 8859, 8-bit single byte coded graphic character sets, 8 have reached DIS stage. Three new parts (two new Latin alphabets and Latin/Thai) are under CD ballot. Further extension of 8859 with new parts is envisaged, contrary to expectation (three new Latin alphabets at least, including one for Vietnamese), and Latin/Sinhala. ISO 7350 will be revised to include registration of subrepertoires of ISO/IEC 10646-1, Universal multiple-octet Coded character Set (UCS), as well. This will provide more fine-tuning of subsets to practical needs. But SC2 decided to suspend progressing it, awaiting a report on 10646 Collection Identifiers. ISO/IEC 10646-1 reached its 13th amendment last year. Concern was expressed by implementers about 10646-1 being a stable standard or not (SC2 N 1388). Nevertheless, at least 6 further amendments are under way now. Apparently the signal was not understood. The newly approved work item for a TR on Character/Glyph Model has resulted in an approved PDTR 15285. The DTR will go out as soon as possible. At the 1996 meetings attention was requested at the WG3 meeting for the effects of WG2 (multiple octet) decisions to the WG3 (single octet) standards. Should an amendment to 10646 also be followed by changes in all other character coding standards, much work would be involved, which has to be justified. This should also be kept in mind at SC22. Unfortunately, there are no signs now that SC2 has understood the issue sufficiently. A number of characters to be added to 10646-1 would make it inconsistent with the repertoire of 6937, on which many systems and implementations have been based. SC2 will meet next in March 1998 in Seattle, USA. A stable future for SC2 has still to be assured. This may be the outcome of the JTC1 Workshop on Cultural adaptability, part of the JTC1 Reengineering activity. ______________________ end of SC22 N2558 ___________________________