Subject: SC22 N2636 - Minutes and Resolutions of WG9 (Ada) November 1997 Meeting

From: "william c. rinehuls" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 18 Dec 1997 16:32:44 -0500 (EST)

___________________ 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
N2636

TITLE:
Minutes and Resolutions of SC22/WG9 (Ada) Meeting on November 14, 1997 in
St. Louis, Missouri, USA

DATE ASSIGNED:
1997-12-18

SOURCE:
Secretariat, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22

BACKWARD POINTER:
N/A

DOCUMENT TYPE:
Minutes of WG9 Meeting

PROJECT NUMBER:
N/A

STATUS:
N/A

ACTION IDENTIFIER:
FYI

DUE DATE:
N/A

DISTRIBUTION:
Txt

CROSS REFERENCE:
N/A

DISTRIBUTION FORM:
Open

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

___________________end of title page; beginning of minutes ___________

Minutes of ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 Meeting #33
Friday, 14 November 1997
St. Louis, Missouri, USA

The 33rd meeting of ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 (Ada) was hosted by ACM SIGAda in
conjunction with the Tri-Ada'97 conference. It was held in Room 312 of the
Holiday Inn Riverfront hotel in conjunction with the Tri-Ada'97 conference,
http://www.acm.org/sigada/tri-ada/.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Agenda

   * Opening Orders
        o Call to Order, Jim Moore, convener
        o Appointment of Meeting Secretary
        o Approval of Agenda
        o Welcome, David Harrison (Conference Chair, TriAda'97)
        o Approval of Minutes of Meeting #32
   * National Body Reports and Introductions
   * Convener's Report
   * Scheduling of Meetings #34 and #35
   * Review of Action Items and Unimplemented Resolutions
   * Report of ASIS Rapporteur Group, Currie Colket (chair)
   * Report of Ada Rapporteur Group, Erhard Ploedereder (chair)
   * Report of Annex H Rapporteur Group, Steve Michell for Brian Wichmann
     (chair)
   * Project Editor Report, IS 11430 and 11729
   * Project Editor Report, DIS 13813
   * Project Editor Report, DIS 13814
   * Project Editor Report, ISO/IEC TR 11735
   * Project Editor Report, ISO/IEC 12227
   * Liaison Reports
        o WG4 (Cobol)
        o WG11 (Language-independent specifications)
        o WG14 (C)
        o WG15 (POSIX), Ted Baker
        o WG20 (Internationalization)
        o WG21 (C++)
        o Java Study Group
        o SC21/WG3 (IRDS)
        o IEEE CS SESC, Jim Moore
        o IEEE SCC20 (Atlas), Bill Whitaker
        o ARA, Joyce Tokar
   * New Business
   * Administrative Actions
   * Final Consideration of Resolutions
   * Adjournment

Attachments

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Detailed Agenda Items

Opening Orders

Call to Order

Jim Moore, Convener, called the meeting to order at about 9:00 AM.

Appointment of Meeting Secretary

Clyde Roby agreed to serve as Secretary for the meeting, in addition to his
continuing duties as the WG9 Webmaster.

Approval of Agenda

The agenda was distributed; no changes were made to it.

Welcome, David Harrison (Chairman, TriAda'97)

On behalf of Tri-Ada'97, David Harrison welcomed WG9 participants to St.
Louis. Jim Moore thanked SIGAda and Tri-Ada for obtaining the room for WG9
to use.

Approval of Minutes of Meeting #32

The minutes of the London meeting, available as document N333, were
unanimously approved by resolution. The resolutions approved at the London
meeting are available as document N331. No corrections to these documents
were proposed.

[See Resolution 33-5.]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

National Body Reports and Introductions

The following delegations and individuals attended this meeting; reports
given are also included.

   * Canada: Steve Michell (head) and Vincent Celier
   * Germany: Erhard Ploedereder (head) and Karlotto Mangold
   * Japan: Kiyoshi Ishihata
   * Sweden: Bjorn Kallberg
   * United Kingdom: John Barnes
   * United States: Joyce Tokar (head) and Ted Baker, Currie Colket, Norm
     Cohen, Mike Kamrad, Clyde Roby
   * Observers: Gary Dismukes and Robert Eachus

Written reports were received from the following delegations:

Report of France

AFNOR met on October 27th in preparation of the WG9 meeting. We voted Yes on
the ASIS proposal, Yes to the proposed response to defects report in the
Posix/Ada binding, and Yes with participation (G. Motet) to the HRG
proposal.

Some members expressed concerns because the summary of voting on the
numerics proposal did not include a mention that our proposed revised
(French) title had been accepted. I think it is normal for this document,
but please make sure that we get a notice of it being formally accepted
(maybe a motion at the meeting).

We approved all proposed AIs, with a comment on AI182. It says (2nd
paragraph of summary):

     "7.6.1(13) is modified so that an anonymous object is not
     finalized until after it is no longer accessible via any name".

Although we agree with the intent, all other AIs state the precise new
wording, and we think the same should be done for this one.

Report of Germany

Germany has a need for Ada programmers. Germany now has a DIN counterpart to
WG9.

Report of Japan

The official activities to make a JIS Standard of Ada 95 have not yet begun.
At this time we cannot show the schedule of the standardization work. In
fact, there exists an informal translation of Ada 95 (ISO/IEC 8652:1995)
into Japanese. It was prepared by a private group formed as an activity of
the Japanese chapter of ACM SIGAda. This translation can be used as a base
document of the JIS Standard, but it is not an easy task to make it conform
to JIS rules (especially in style issues).

Report of Netherlands

Netherlands continues to support the work of the Annex H RG.

Report of Sweden

Sweden will participate in the HRG.

Report of UK

The UK continues to support the work of the HRG.

Report of US

The US would like a discussion of Ada interfaces to Java, C++, and possibly
ODBC; we think that there is a possible need to begin a working group.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Convener's Report

Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting, Ottawa, Canada, 18-22 August 1997

Representing WG9, convener attended the SC22 plenary meeting in Ottawa,
Canada. [This report is available as N335.] Results of the meeting are noted
at the appropriate points in the agenda.

Thanks were extended to Steve Michell of Canada for the productive time in
Ottawa at SC22.

WG9 Web Page

>From convener: Clyde Roby continues his fine work in maintaining WG9's web
page at http://www.dkuug.dk/JTC1/SC22/WG9/

When asked if the WG9 web site was being used productively, members from all
national bodies responded in the affirmative.

Copyrights on ISO Working Documents

>From N328 and N329, Convener's 1997 Report: [One of] the most important
task[s] of WG9 is to set up a defect resolution and clarification process
for IS 8652; this work would eventually lead to formal COR or AMD documents
or to a revision of the base standard. So that preliminary defect reports
and clarifications may be properly circulated among the entire community of
concern, it is necessary that they be openly available without copyright
restrictions. The current uncertainty regarding the copyright issue
endangers satisfactory performance of this task. Even the one-year trial
relaxation of the policy is inadequate because the threat remains that once
such material is introduced into the JTC1 process, it is subject to
imposition of copyright in the future.

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: In behalf of WG9,
I requested that SC22 make a request to JTC1 to allow WG9 to provide public
access to any Technical Corrigenda document prepared for the Ada standard.
(Public access is already permitted for Defect Reports and Working Group
Responses.) This request was approved; it is anticipated that JTC1 will
approve the request because there is precedent.

>From SC22 Secretariat's note to JTC1 Secretariat: At the August 18-21, 1997
meeting of JTC 1/SC22, SC22 passed a resolution requesting ISO/IEC JTC 1 to
request ITTF to permit SC22/WG9 (Ada) to make publicly available the
Technical Corrigenda and Record of Responses for ISO/IEC 8652:1995 -
Programming Language Ada.

>From SC22 Chairman's report from JTC1 Plenary: JTC1 instructed the JTC1
Secretariat to request approval from the ISO and IEC Councils to place on
the World Wide Web the Technical Corrigenda and Records of Responses to
ISO/IEC 8652, Programming Language Ada.

This has been endorsed by SC22, by JTC1, and it is expected to be endorsed
soon by the central secretariat.

Electronic Distribution of Documents

Convener's summary of status from meeting #32: There was general support for
ISO's intention to perform more work via electronic correspondence. For our
own correspondence, it was generally agreed that:

   * proprietary formats such as WordPerfect and Microsoft Word should be
     avoided, especially for formal documents;
   * plain text files are acceptable;
   * HTML files are acceptable;
   * PostScript is probably the best choice for non-revisable formatted
     documents. (PC users should obtain the GhostScript and GhostView
     programs in order to conveniently view and print PostScript.)

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: In behalf of WG9,
I requested that SC22 support a request to JTC1 to add PostScript to the
list of acceptable formats for the electronic distribution of documents.
This request was NOT approved. Apparently, this issue is old and contentious
and few people want to reconsider it. In a straw vote within SC22, a slight
majority of delegations supported the request but the margin was considered
too narrow to constitute grounds for a strong request to JTC1 to change the
existing plan of action. One of the other Working Group conveners has agreed
to provide an FTP mechanism which we may use to produce PDF from PostScript
documents.

>From Convener: As you know, SC22 has rejected our request for their support
in adding PostScript to the list of acceptable formats for distributing
documents. Their action effectively kills the issue. Therefore, to circulate
any document at the level of SC22 or above, we must be able to place it in
one of the acceptable formats. Those formats include:

   * Microsoft Word - Version 2.0 through 7.0
   * WordPerfect - Version 5.1 through 7.0
   * Plain DOS Text file, encoded in ISO/IEC 8859-1
   * Portable Document Format (PDF)
   * Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)
   * Rich Text Format (RTF)

(More information is available at:
http://www.dkuug.dk/JTC1/IMPIT/open/j14769.doc.)

The difficulties in using Word, WordPerfect or RTF for drafts of complex
documents have been extensively discussed in WG9. This suggests that, in the
future, we might want to distribute documents in the form of PDF.

The note at http://www.dkuug.dk/JTC1/SC22/WG9/PS-to-PDF.txt describes an
experimental service being provided by another WG convener in SC22. This
service will convert PostScript documents to PDF. You might want to try it
out.

Documents circulated only within WG9 can be in any form that we find
acceptable, including PostScript.

Currently, documents submitted to ISO Central Secretariat for publication
may be in a wide variety of formats, but this may change. When we decide to
submit a Technical Corrigenda, we will have to submit it in PDF or one of
the other formats.

Clyde Roby volunteered to provide a facility to convert PostScript files to
PDF.

It was noted that the converter provided by another WG did not work for Ted
Baker when he ran a POSIX document through it.

Revised Procedures for the Progress of Documents

>From SC22 Chairman's report from JTC1 Plenary: JTC1 approved a requirement
that its standards development groups develop an "Executive Summary" to
accompany standards. This will be a separate document for information and
distribution purposes, although it could also be used in the standard itself
as an introduction. The intent is to use the executive summary in external
communication and information efforts. Although it will be required during
the review period and may be subject to comment, its content will not be
part of the ballot on the standard.

>From SC22 Chairman's report from JTC1 Plenary: JTC1 decided that Technical
Corrigenda under ballot in an SC will no longer be distributed at the JTC1
level, with the proviso that JTC1 must be kept informed of any Technical
Corrigenda under development and/or submitted to ITTF for publication.

Reorganization of JTC1

Jim Moore noted that the reorganization has occurred in order to focus on
those standards of more importance (to the commercial community).

>From SC22 Chairman's report from JTC1 Plenary: SCs 14, 18, 21, and 30 are
disbanded (either immediately or following one additional plenary) and two
new SCs are created: SC32 on Data Management Services and SC33 on
Distributed Application Services. Other ad hoc and special working groups
were disbanded.

>From Convener: SC21 had been responsible for the Ada binding to IRDS.

It was noted during the WG9 meeting that the standardization activities for
IRDS will probably end up in SC32.

Progress of Numerics Standards

>From Convener: DIS 13813 and DIS 13814 were overwhelmingly approved in
balloting. Both ballots were approved by 20 votes in favor and 1 vote
against. The national body voting against the two documents will reverse its
vote when a straightforward change is made to them. The next step is for the
Project Editors, Don Sando and Jon Squire, to prepare Disposition of
Comments reports and revise the text for publication as an IS.

Accelerated Balloting of ASIS

>From Convener: SC22 approved our request for concurrent CD registration and
Final CD balloting of WD 15291. That ballot is currently underway and will
conclude on March 9, 1998.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Scheduling of Meetings #34 and #35

>From convener: The schedule for meeting #34 was already adopted during the
London meeting of WG9. The schedule for meeting #35 is proposed for the
first time:

   * Meeting #34, 12 June 1998, Uppsala, Sweden, hosted by Swedish National
     Body, in conjunction with Ada-Europe conference.
   * Meeting #35, 13 November, 1998, Washington, D.C., USA, hosted by US
     National Body, in conjunction with the SIGAda conference.

[See Resolution 33-4.]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Review of Action Items and Unimplemented Resolutions

JTC1 requires each working group to maintain a standing list of documents.
Jim Moore is planning to keep as few as possible; he will roll over
unfinished resolutions and action items from meeting to meeting. These will
always be included in the minutes of each meeting as well as the draft
agenda for the following meeting.

>From convener: This is the "To Do" list for WG9. Some are informal action
items assigned to various participants. Some are formal resolutions which
are not yet implemented. Some are suspense items awaiting action by other
groups.

Open Action Items

ACTION 31-8 [Moore]:

After resolution of the ISO copyright issue, determine a schedule for
preparation of a technical corrigenda to the Ada standard, ISO/IEC 8652.

     Status: A request for relief from ISO copyright policy has been
     made, endorsed by SC22, endorsed by JTC1, and forwarded to ISO
     Central Secretariat for disposition. This remains open; Jim Moore
     is working with Erhard Ploedereder to resolve this item.

Unimplemented Resolutions

RESOLUTION 32-4:

The following guidance is provided to the Ada Rapporteur Group in dealing
with Ada Issues: it should be possible to write portable bindings to C
programs. The Ada Rapporteur Group is requested to propose an appropriate
mechanism.

     Status: ARG will consider this at its meeting beginning on 14
     November.

RESOLUTION 32-5:

WG9 forwards a proposed New Work Item, "Guidance for the Use of Ada in High
Integrity Systems," to ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22 and recommends that SC22 propose
its approval by JTC1. WG9 is prepared to accept the responsibility for the
performance of this project.

     Status: The New Work Item is currently being balloted. Approval is
     anticipated at JTC1; it has already been attained at SC22.

RESOLUTION 32-6:

WG9 provides the following direction to the Annex H Rapporteur Group (HRG)
for the performance of any project resulting from approval of the proposed
New Work Item on "Guidance for the Use of Ada in High Integrity Systems":

     WG9 directs the HRG to present the resolution of this Work Item in
     a positive fashion which includes some abstraction of the
     regulatory rules; the resolution shall demonstrate:

        * how Ada supports these abstractions
        * how other languages support these abstractions
        * usage paradigms for resolutions of these abstractions with a
          subset of Ada

     Status: This issue will be considered at the next meeting of the
     HRG. It was noted that a formal response to this item would be a
     document.

RESOLUTION 32-8:

WG9 authorizes the Convener, in his judgment, to request simultaneous
processing of any or all of the following steps in the progress of project
15291: CD registration, CD ballot, final CD ballot.

     Status: CLOSED. Convener requested, and SC22 approved, concurrent
     balloting for CD registration and Final CD ballot. That balloting
     is now underway.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Report of ASIS Rapporteur Group, Currie Colket (chair)

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.15291-- WD 15291 Ada Semantic Interface Specification (ASIS),
Clyde Roby and Steve Blake, editors.

Currie distributed two documents:

   * ASIS Report for WG9
   * ASIS Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) List

At this meeting of WG9, Currie gave a brief overview of the ASIS related
activites that occurred at Tri-Ada'97.

Resolution from Meeting #32: The disposition of comments on the ASIS Working
Draft ballot is approved by WG9 and the Project Editor of project 15291 is
authorized to forward Version 2.0.N of the draft to the SC22 secretariat for
CD registration.

     Currie noted that Version 2.0.P of ASIS was actually forwarded.

Resolution from Meeting #32: WG9 authorizes the Convener, in his judgment,
to request simultaneous processing of any or all of the following steps in
the progress of project 15291: CD registration, CD ballot, final CD ballot.

>From convener: In preparation for the expedited balloting process used for
ASIS, ISO Central Secretariat performed an editorial review of the working
draft.

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report: WG9 requests approval for
simultaneous CD registration and FCD balloting of the Working Draft 15291.

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: In behalf of WG9,
I requested that the CD registration ballot and the Final CD Balloting for
project JTC1.22.15291 (ASIS) be conducted concurrently. This request was
approved. We can anticipate that this ballot will commence in September if
we promptly provide the draft for balloting.

>From the Resolutions of the SC22 Plenary Meeting:

Resolution 97-21: Concurrent Letter Ballots for Ada ASIS:

     ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22 authorizes the Secretariat to conduct
     concurrent CD registration and Final CD letter ballots for project
     JTC 1.22.15291 - Ada Semantic Interface Specification (ASIS).

SC22 ballot on combined CD Registration and Final CD is underway: Due March
9, 1998. SC22 Letter Ballot N2588 - Concurrent CD Registration and FCD
Approval for Ada Semantic Interface Specification (ASIS).

>From Currie Colket, Chair of ASIS RG: Preliminary Report (See Attachments)

The ASIS RG has discovered four additional issues. They would like to
arrange for national bodies to include these issues in their FCD ballot.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Report of Ada Rapporteur Group, Erhard Ploedereder (chair)

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.10.01 -- IS 8652:1995 Programming Languages: Ada, Erhard
Ploedereder and Bob Duff, editors.

Planning for the revision of 8652 is commencing.

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: In behalf of WG9,
I requested that Erhard Ploedereder and Bob Duff be named as the Project
Editors of project JTC1.22.10.01 (the Ada standard). This request was
approved.

ACTION 31-8 [Moore]: After resolution of the ISO copyright issue, determine
a schedule for preparation of a technical corrigenda to the Ada standard,
ISO/IEC 8652.

     Status: A request for relief from ISO copyright policy has been
     made, endorsed by SC22, endorsed by JTC1, and forwarded to ISO
     Central Secretariat for disposition.

Convener's summary of status from meeting #32: The ARG reported that most of
its remaining backlog of Ada Issues will be resolved before the next
meeting. Their plan is to produce an initial working draft of a Technical
Corrigendum by July 1998 and to complete its approval and publication by the
year 2000. The document would be a collection of issues and responses like
the Corrigendum to the C language prepared in another working group of SC22.

Resolution passed at meeting #32: The following guidance is provided to the
Ada Rapporteur Group in dealing with Ada Issues: it should be possible to
write portable bindings to C programs. The Ada Rapporteur Group is requested
to propose an appropriate mechanism.

     Status: ARG will consider this at its meeting beginning on 14
     November.

Report of ARG Chair: The ARG has not met since the June WG9 meeting. Its
next meeting is scheduled to begin right after the WG9 meeting in St. Louis.
The ARG is still plagued by diminishing funding for its members.

Mainly out of the Henley meeting in April, the ARG submits the following AIs
for approval by WG9.

[See Resolution 33-3.]

All these AIs can be found on:
http://sw-eng.falls-church.va.us/AdaIC/standards/95com/ada-issues/arg-approved/

Erhard distributed "The ARG Work Sheet", a description of the status of AI
processing:

       Status as of 97/4/11

Deleted AIs:                 3
subsumed editorial AIs:      5
ARG-approved AARM AIs:      16

WG9-approved editorial AIs:  9
WG9-approved AIs:           85

ARG-approved AIs:           13

Work Item AIs:              35 (9 "high", 12 "medium", 14 "low" priority)
Unprocessed AIs:            28 (4 "high", 14 "medium", 10 "low" priority)
Presentation AI:             1
                           ---
                           195

Comparisons:

97/10:  64 open AIs (of 195)
96/12:  65 open AIs (of 175)
95/12: 103 open AIs (of 103)

Erhard also noted that funding is a problem, particularly for Bob Duff.

Erhard noted the French comment and stated that the premise of the comment
is false. Precise new wording is not generally placed in AIs. The wording if
provided is only viewed as a suggestion (to avoid spending a lot of time on
wordsmithing). But it is funny that the wording section in this AI is left
empty. It will be changed to: "(See summary)".

With this change, the resolution is approved.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Report of Annex H Rapporteur Group, Steve Michell for Brian Wichmann (chair)

Resolution from meeting #32: WG9 forwards a proposed New Work Item,
"Guidance for the Use of Ada in High Integrity Systems," to ISO/IEC
JTC1/SC22 and recommends that SC22 propose its approval by JTC1. WG9 is
prepared to accept the responsibility for the performance of this project.
(The submitted NWI is N332.)

Resolution from meeting #32: WG9 provides the following direction to the
Annex H Rapporteur Group (HRG) for the performance of any project resulting
from approval of the proposed New Work Item on "Guidance for the Use of Ada
in High Integrity Systems":

     WG9 directs the HRG to present the resolution of this Work Item in
     a positive fashion which includes some abstraction of the
     regulatory rules; the resolution shall demonstrate:

       1. how Ada supports these abstractions
       2. how other languages support these abstractions
       3. usage paradigms for resolutions of these abstractions with a
          subset of Ada

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report: WG9 recommends approval of the
New Work Item proposal for "Guidance for the use of Ada in High Integrity
Systems" and is prepared to accept responsibility for a project resulting
from the proposed NWI.

>From Convener: JTC1 has asked that the NWI and the justification (N332) be
resubmitted in the form of HTML. The Chair of the HRG has complied. The
resulting document is N337.

SC22 ballot on the New Work Item: Due October 28, SC22 Letter Ballot N2494 -
Approval of a Proposal for a NWI on "Guidance for the use of Ada in High
Integrity Systems" - Type 3 Technical Report.

SC22 support of the NWI: SC22 Document N2605, "Summary of Voting" shows that
seven member bodies agree to participate, that the UK has offered a Project
Editor, Gareth Rowlands, and that Canada has offered to contribute a
document. Accordingly, the SC22 Secretariat has forwarded the NWI to JTC1
for their approval.

Steve Michell noted that US did not vote on the NWI. HRG would very much
like participation from the US.

The following schedule was put forward:

   * Now to January: rewrite existing document and internal review.
   * January 31: goes to HRG mailing list
   * March 9-11: review meeting in Netherlands, near Amsterdam
   * April 30: send revised document to WG9 electronically for approval for
     submission for CD registration.
   * June 10-11: meeting immediately before WG9 in Uppsalla to discuss any
     issues

Steve Michell and Jim Moore will communicate via email to develop an overall
schedule. Perhaps the HRG document will be complete by the end of 1999.

The Canadian contribution is at www.ora.on.ca.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Editor Report, IS 11430 and 11729

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.10.02 -- IS 11430:1994 Generic Package of Elementary Functions
for Ada, Ken Dritz, editor.

Project 22.10.03 -- IS 11729:1994 Generic Package of Primitive Functions for
Ada, Ken Dritz, editor.

The contents of 11430 and 11729 are substantively subsumed by the subsequent
approval of the 1995 revision of 8652. These standards will probably be
withdrawn circa 1999.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Editor Report, DIS 13813

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.10.04 -- DIS 13813 Generic packages of real and complex type
declarations and basic operations for Ada (including vector and matrix
types), Don Sando and Ken Dritz, editors.

Completion in 1998 is planned.

>From Convener: DIS 13813 and DIS 13814 were overwhelmingly approved in
balloting. Both ballots were approved by 20 votes in favor and 1 vote
against. The national body voting against the two documents will reverse its
vote when a straightforward change is made to them. The next step is for the
Project Editors, Don Sando and Jon Squire, to prepare Disposition of
Comments reports and revise the text for publication as an IS.

The following from the French delegation:

     Some members expressed concerns because the summary of voting on
     the numerics proposal did not include a mention that our proposed
     revised (French) title had been accepted. I think it is normal for
     this document, but please make sure that we get a notice of it
     being formally accepted (maybe a motion at the meeting).

The Project Editors can probably deal with this issue in their Disposition
of Comments reports, which are not yet prepared.

[See Resolution 33-1.]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Editor Report, DIS 13814

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.10.05 -- DIS 13814 Generic package of complex elementary
functions for Ada, Jon Squire and Ken Dritz, editors.

Completion in 1998 is planned.

>From Convener: DIS 13813 and DIS 13814 were overwhelmingly approved in
balloting. Both ballots were approved by 20 votes in favor and 1 vote
against. The national body voting against the two documents will reverse its
vote when a straightforward change is made to them. The next step is for the
Project Editors, Don Sando and Jon Squire, to prepare Disposition of
Comments reports and revise the text for publication as an IS.

>From Jon Squire: I have read and understand all the requested changes. I
just need a day to make them very carefully, so I do not introduce and new
problems. Should be finished by the end of October, so you can report that
changes have been made.

The following from the French delegation:

     Some members expressed concerns because the summary of voting on
     the numerics proposal did not include a mention that our proposed
     revised (French) title had been accepted. I think it is normal for
     this document, but please make sure that we get a notice of it
     being formally accepted (maybe a motion at the meeting).

The Project Editors can probably deal with this issue in their Disposition
of Comments reports, which are not yet prepared.

[See Resolution 33-2.]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Editor Report, ISO/IEC TR 11735

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.35 -- (Type 2) TR 11735:1996 EXTensions for real-time Ada, Nasser
Kettani, editor.

The contents of 11735 are substantively subsumed by the 1995 revision of
8652. This Technical Report will be withdrawn when usage of the 1987 version
of the Ada language has diminished.

>From Project Editor: No activity to report.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Editor Report, ISO/IEC 12227

>From N328 and N329, 1997 Convener's Report:

Project 22.31 -- IS 12227:1995 SQL/Ada Module Description Language (SAMeDL),
Andreas Koeller, editor.

WG9 has determined that the revision of 12227 is currently unnecessary; this
decision will be reconsidered periodically.

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: In behalf of WG9,
I requested that Andreas Koeller be named as the Project Editor of project
JTC1.22.31 (SAMeDL). This request was approved.

Convener's summary of status from meeting #32: None of the national bodies
is interested in further work on SQL/Ada bindings beyond the current IS
12227 (SAMeDL) standard and the bindings included in the IS 9075 (SQL)
standard.

Jim Moore noted that when this comes up for renewal, we will either vote to
withdraw it or to reaffirm it.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Liaison Reports

WG4 (Cobol)

No known activity.

WG11 (Language-independent specifications)

WG11 has a great deal of momentum and is tending toward stabilization. From
WG9's viewpoint, any perceived problems will diminish.

WG14 (C)

The C++ and the C standardization groups had been on a diverging path (C++
is supposed to be upward compatible with C). The two groups have decided to
carve out a core part of the language which will support both
standardization efforts, from which both groups will add from their
respective directions.

WG15 (POSIX), Ted Baker

>From Ted Baker: The POSIX standards continue to be primarily oriented to the
C language, though work on Ada bindings continues alongside.

The IEEE is conducting reaffirmation ballots for IEEE STD 1003.9 (Fortran
binding to 1003.1) and IEEE STD 1003.5 (Ada binding to 1003.1). Ted noted at
this WG9 meeting that these have gone forward.

The reaffirmation ballot for 1003.5 has been combined with reaffirmation of
IEEE STD 1003.5b-1996, so that the combined document will be in sync. There
was one negative vote on the ballot, so the negative comments are currently
being recirculated. The result should be known by the time of the WG9
meeting.

IEEE STD 1003.5-1992, which corresponds to SC22 NP 22.21.04.02, was balloted
in JTC1 as ISO/IEC DIS 14519-1 under the fast-track procedure, starting back
in 1993. The ballot was completed, but the standard was never published by
ISO. (I don't know why.)

The combined document IEEE STD 1003.5-1992 as amended by IEEE STD
1003.5b-1996 -- the same document that is going through IEEE reaffirmation
ballot -- is now being submitted for fast-track ballot in JTC1, as DIS
14519. The vote started on 18 September 1997 and terminates on 18 March
1998.

There are several Ada language binding projects in the IEEE that do not have
corresponding SC22 work items. These include:

   * 1003.5c -- Ada binding for 1003.5g (Protocol-Independent Interfaces).
     This is about to start a second round of IEEE ballot, after reformation
     of the balloting group to drop nonresponders.
   * 1003.5f -- Ada binding for 1003.21 (Real-Time Distributed Sys. Comm).
     This is being drafted.
   * 1003.24 -- Ada binding: X Window Modular Toolkit. This is being
     drafted.

If there is sufficient international interest, perhaps one or more of these
should be considered. There are several other POSIX standards for which Ada
binding projects might be appropriate. Volunteers are welcome.

Ada standards people are accustomed to being told that Ada has lost the
"language wars" to C (or is that C++? or is that Java?). The POSIX folks are
getting a taste of the same situation now.

IEEE PASC, which sponsors the POSIX standards, has been under pressure from
commercial interests (most vocally Hewlett-Packard) to stop making new
standards. The contention is that Microsoft has won the OS war, UNIX is a
"dead" operating system, and that attempts to further improve a dead OS
cause trouble for the vendors (like HP) who are trying to get out of the
business of producing and maintaining operating systems. Apparently, these
hardware vendors are unhappy that the "dead" OS won't keep still.

Reaffirmation of P1003.5 and P1003.5b has been completed and sent to the
IEEE Standards Board.

The ISO equivalent of 1003.5b is on fast-track ballot in JTC1.

P1003.5c is in IEEE balloting.

WG20 (Internationalization)

>From convener's note of 25 August 1997: I know that some of you are
interested in the topic of "internationalization" of Ada and other
programming languages. Perhaps you would be willing to comment on the
attached material.

WG20 has already written a Draft Technical Report on the provisions that
programming languages should make to achieve the goals of
internationalization. In order to ease the implementation of such
provisions, they are considering proposing a new work item to provide an API
for access to internationalization information and cultural conventions.

On the other hand, they are not interested in pursuing the NWI if none of
the language WGs would be willing to use it. Therefore, they are looking for
comment from the other WGs. Please send your comments to me. I will bundle
them and forward them to WG20.

WG21 (C++)

Liaison report copied from the minutes of WG14: Plum reported that the
second CD ballot for the pending C++ standard has closed. The committee has
received a long list of public comments on the second CD, but the good news
is that there appear to be no diametrically opposed comments in this set of
ballots. Plum believes most delegations are satisfied with the current draft
pending the resolution of its comments. The committee meets again in two
weeks to organize the comments from the second CD and begin to resolve them.
The committee plans to complete a new draft by November, at which time the
SC22 Secretariat will determine if the new draft satisfies the requirements
for a DIS.

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: Some of you may be
interested in the status of the CD balloting of the C++ document. The WG
convener reported that about ten issues remain to be resolved; the others
have been unanimously resolved. It is expected that the final issues will be
resolved and the document will go to Final DIS ballot shortly after their
planned November 1997. There is some consideration of a plan whereby the WGs
for C and C++ will collocate their meetings and a plan whereby the C++ WG
and the C WG would agree that the responsibility for maintenance of the
common portions of the languages would be delegated to the C WG.

>From a press release by Tom Plum, convener of WG21: The process of
standardizing the C++ programming language began eight years ago, in late
1989. The international C++ Working Group is ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG21; the USA
C++ Technical Committee is J16. This week, J16 has been meeting co-located
with WG21. All the delegations present at this meeting have decided that the
technical content of the standard for C++ is now complete and stable. Thus,
the C++ Working Paper will be approved at this week's meeting, to be
forwarded to ISO/IEC JTC1 to become a "Final Draft International Standard"
(FDIS). No further changes can be made to an FDIS.

During the week of the WG9 meeting, the Final DIS for C++ was submitted; it
is very likely that we shall see an international standard for C++ by the
end of 1998.

Java Study Group

>From N335, WG9 Convener's Report of SC22 Plenary Meeting: Some of you may be
interested in the status of issues related to Java. The convener of the Java
study group reported that the request of Sun Microsystems for recognition as
a PAS submitter was disapproved with comments from several nations. At this
time, Sun has not yet responded. The JSG convener also reported that ECMA
(European Computer Manufacturers Association) has approved standard 262 on
ECMAScript, the language commonly known as JavaScript. Their standard is
publicly available on the ECMA web site and will be submitted to JTC1 for
fast-track processing.

>From Liaison Report of the Convener of the Java Study Group: JTC1 is in the
process of polling each of its members about whether their votes on Sun's
application to be recognized as a PAS submitter would change based on Sun's
reply to the previous ballot. That issue doesn't close until November 11.
Details are available on both the JavaSoft and JTC1 TAG Web sites and in the
trade press.

The Java Study Group is waiting to determine its future role until this
issue is resolved.

WG9 members who have not already done so are encourage to participate or
follow the work of the Java Study Group by subscribing to our mailing list
as described on our Web page http://www.dkuug.dk/jtc1/sc22/jsg.

SC21/WG3 (IRDS)

Convener's summary: The base standard for IRDS is: ISO/IEC 10728:1993,
Information technology -- Information Resource Dictionary System
(IRDS)--Services Interface. The Ada binding to IRDS is: Amendment 2:1996 to
ISO/IEC 10728:1993, Ada language binding. Information regarding ISO
standards can be found at http://www.iso.ch.

As part of the reengineering of JTC1, SC21 has been dissolved and its
responsibilities assigned to other SCs. There are no plans to reestablish
liaison to working groups now responsible for IRDS.

IEEE CS SESC, Jim Moore

>From Jim Moore: IEEE Std 990 on the use of Ada as a PDL will be
administratively withdrawn during 1998 because it has reached its maximum
age of 5 years. There is no known interest in revising the standard to the
level of Ada 95.

IEEE SCC20, William Whitaker

I am the Ada representative (AdaJPO/WG9 represenative) to IEEE Standards
Coordinating Committee 20, the Automatic Text Equipment (ATLAS) Comittee.
Since 1989, IEEE has had a standards project to do an Ada binding to the ATE
language ATLAS. This was once Project 1226, and produced IEEE Stds 1226.1
and 1226.2. The 1226 Group has been redirected to non-Ada things (and may be
near death). The Ada/ATLAS portion was given a new IEEE project number,
P1446, working in the same group.

Recently, there has been a falling off of interest and participation as the
Ada Mandate slipped, starting with the removal of the Ada requirement for
the ATE for F-22. But there was still some interest and the project has
continued slowly. With the final end of the Ada Mandate (and after a few
months of thinking about it), industry has completely abandoned any interest
in Ada/ATLAS and P1446. As a result, the Project will be withdrawn at the
SCC20 meeting next week.

ARA, Joyce Tokar

Joyce Tokar made the following ARA Liaison report of ARA activities.

The ARA met on the evening of Wednesday, 12 November, 1997. During this
meeting, the ARA focused on the issues associated with the closing of the
AJPO which is scheduled for October 1998. The primary issues of concern
were:

  1. The $15M promised in the NRC Report
  2. Validation
  3. The other AJPO tasks and materials
  4. Ada awareness
  5. ARA membership

Information about each of these issues of concern:

  1. Tucker Taft has agreed to contact the Undersecretary of Defense for
     Acquisition Technology (Gansler) to address the distribution of the
     $15M.

  2. The ARA is very interested in maintaining the commonality between
     implementations of the Ada language, the continuance of the Ada
     validation, and the maintenance of the ACVC test suite. To address the
     needs of maintaining the test suite and the validation of compilation
     systems, the ARA is developing validation policy and procedures to be
     completed in December 1997. Formal announcement of the policy and
     procedures will be early in 1998. The AJPO, AVFs, and AVO have accepted
     the proposal of the ARA assuming the responsibilities for validation of
     compilation systems and the maintenance of the test suites. As part of
     the procedures to be defined, there will be a mechanism to add test
     suites to the validation test suite. In addition, as mentioned earlier,
     the ARA is interested in continuing the commonality between vendors. To
     this end, the ARA will work together to introduce new pragmas and
     similar capabilities when appropriate.

  3. The ARA is interested in the development of an ARA web site that is the
     master site for Ada. The set of Ada advocacy documentation currently
     available from the AJPO will be put into HTML format to be posted on
     this site. The ARA will work with the AJPO to determine what other AJPO
     material should be moved into HTML format for the ARA site. A Request
     for Proposal (RFP) will be distributed within two weeks to parties
     interested in developing and maintaining this web site.

  4. Ben Brosgol presented the current state of the Ada Awareness Program of
     SIGAda. Part of this program is to attend conferences where Ada-philes
     do not generally attend to increase the visibility of Ada. The plans
     for 1998 have a short-fall in resources to support these activities.
     The ARA has agreed to support this program by contributing $15K to
     SIGAda. In return, SIGAda has agreed to include an ARA brochure for
     distribution at the SIGAda booth and to allow the ARA influence the
     selection of conferences to attend.

  5. The final activity of the ARA is to refine the definition of membership
     to the ARA. A charter of the ARA is to be developed and distributed in
     December 1997. The associate fee structure, by-laws, and other
     association activities will be addressed early in 1998.

  6. The ARA also agreed to support Bob Duff in his activities with the ARG.
     Further discussion with Bob is required to determine the appropriate
     level of support.

  7. The next meeting of the ARA is scheduled to occur during the STC
     conference in April 1998.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

New Business

The following item was added to the agenda for subsequent discussion: U. S.
suggestion for work on interfaces to Java, C++ and ODBC. In particular, the
US proposed that a new working group be established to investigate the
creation of an officially approved set of packages for Java, C++, and ODBC;
the working group could define the set of packages to be delivered to the
ARA.

Jim Moore, as chair, followed up with this as an administrative action.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Administrative Actions

The following Rapporteur Group Chairs are reappointed: Erhard Ploedereder
(ARG), Currie Colket (ASIS RG), and Brian Wichmann (Annex H RG). The
responsibility for designating additional members of the RG is delegated to
the respective RG chairs.

An Interface Rapporteur Group (IRG) is to be created under the temporary
chair of David Emery with membership of Vincent Celier, and others to be
designated by National Bodies in the upcoming weeks. The IRG is directed to
present recommendations at the June WG9 meeting to include the following:

   * the scope of work to be undertaken by the IRG;
   * the time frame in which the task is to be completed;
   * the membership of the group;
   * the identification of the group's convener; and
   * one or more samples of the work to be undertaken.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Final Consideration of Resolutions

All resolutions were approved unanimously by the represented national body
delegations.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Adjournment

Adjournment occurred shortly after noon.

__________________ end of minutes; beginning of resolutions ___________

Resolutions Approved at Meeting #33
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22/WG9
November 14, 1997
St. Louis, Missouri, USA

All resolutions were approved unanimously by the represented national body
delegations.

Resolution 33-1:

Convener is authorized to act for WG9 in approving the disposition of
comments on the DIS ballot of 13813 and forwarding the draft to ISO Central
Secretariat for publication.

Resolution 33-2:

Convener is authorized to act for WG9 in approving the disposition of
comments on the DIS ballot of 13814 and forwarding the draft to ISO Central
Secretariat for publication.

Resolution 33-3:

ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 approves the following Ada Issues which have been
previously approved by the ARG:

   * AI95-00055/01 -- Overflow for Adjacent, Machine, and Model attributes
     [Status: ARG approved (6-1-0) subject to editorial review 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00067/02 -- Pragma Restrictions(Max_Tasks,
     Max_Asynchronous_Select_Nesting)
     [Status: ARG approved (7-0-3) subject to editorial review 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00098/01 -- unknown_discriminant_parts on generic formal types.
     [Status: ARG approved (6-0-1) subject to editorial review 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00102/01 -- A generic formal limited private type can have an
     access discriminant.
     [Status: ARG approved (6-0-1) subject to editorial review 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00104/05 -- Version and Body_Version attributes
     [Status: ARG approved 8-0-1 (subject to editorial review) 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00126/07 -- Classification of Language-Defined Packages
     [Status: ARG Approved (letter ballot: 11-0-0) 97-10-5]
   * AI95-00141/05 -- Exceptions in Interfaces.C and its Children
     [Status: ARG Approved (subject to editorial review) 8-1-1 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00177/02 -- Interfaces.C.Strings.Value with len returning String
     [Status: ARG Approved (letter ballot: 9-0-2) 97-10-5 ]
   * AI95-00179/02 -- Finalization and Unchecked_Deallocation
     [Status: ARG Approved (subject to editorial review) 9-0-1 97-04-11]
   * AI95-00181/02 -- components of Stream_Element_Array should be ALIASED
     [Status: ARG Approved (letter ballot: 9-1-0) 97-10-5]
   * AI95-00183/02 -- Primitive operations declared before it is known if
     the type is tagged
     [Status: ARG Approved 7-0-0 97-04-11]

WG9 approves the following AI with a wording change, the addition of "(See
summary)".

   * AI95-00182/02 -- Extension aggregates with controlled subcomponents
     [Status: ARG Approved (subject to editorial review) 10-0-0 97-04-11]

Resolution 33-4:

Meeting #35 of ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 is scheduled as follows:

   * Meeting #35, 13 November, 1998, Washington, D.C., USA, hosted by US
     National Body, in conjunction with the SIGAda conference.

Resolution 33-5:

The minutes of Meeting #32 as contained in document N333 and the resolutions
of that meeting as contained in document N331 are approved.

Resolution 33-6:

WG9 thanks the ARA for its continued work and financial support for Ada. The
convener of WG9 is directed to investigate forming a closer relationship
with the ARA for our mutual benefit.

Resolution 33-7:

WG9 expresses its gratitude to SIGAda for hosting Meeting #33.

Resolution 33-8:

ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 expresses its grateful appreciation to Don Sando and
Jon Squire for their continuing service as Project Editors of 13813 and
13814.

Resolution 33-9:

ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 expresses its grateful appreciation to Clyde Roby for
serving as secretary of meeting 33.

Resolution 33-10:

ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 expresses its grateful appreciation to Clyde Roby for
maintaining the WG9 Web Page.

Resolution 33-11:

ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG9 expresses its grateful appreciation to Erhard
Ploedereder, Currie Colket, and Brian Wichmann for their continued service
as Rapporteur Group chairs.

__________________________ end of SC22 N2636 _________________________