Subject: Minutes of 14th ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG16 meeting

From: Pierre Parquier <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Jun 1996 12:14:09 +0200

Hi, Bill:

WG16 just issued the minutes of our last meeting in Gentilly (next to
Paris).  You may want to register and distribute it as an SC22
document.

Pierre

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ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG16 N177

Minutes of 14th Meeting of ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG16 LISP,
March 25-26, 1996, Gentilly/Paris, France.

Meeting record by Kent Pitman.

MONDAY

9:05am Meeting convened

(1) Opening/Organizational matters

    Pitman to take minutes.

(2) Roll call

    Canada (CA)         - W. Wright
    United Stats (US)   - K. Pitman
    Japan (JP)          - T. Ito, T. Yuasa
    United Kingdom (UK) - J. Padget, D. DeRoure
    France (FR)         - C. Jullien, B. Haible
    Convenor            - P. Parquier

    [Note that later in the meeting, very early in proessing of
     responses to national bodies, Mr. U. Cortes arrived 
     to represent Spain (ES).  -kmp]

(3) Approval of the Agenda

    Approve?  yes, unanimously (JP, US, FR, CA, UK)

(4) Approval of Minutes of Ottawa Meeting

    Approve?  yes, unanimously (UK, CA, FR, US, JP)

(5) Recognition of Distributed Documents

    169 - WG16 working draft 15.6
    170 - WG16 working draft 15.6 (effectively a duplicate)
    171 - Draft Agenda and Venue for Meeting
    172 - Resolutions of SC22 meeting
    173 - Unofficial summary of national comments
	(SC22 N2080 is the OFFICIAL summary for reference)

(6) Current Standardization Progress in National Bodies

    JP - 2 meetings since Ottawa.
	 Sent comments to Queinnec & Pitman,
	  which were reviewed and incorporated in draft 15.6.

    US - Produced draft 15.6.
	 Vote to approve draft 15.6 with no comments.

    FR - Met 3 times.  Did intensive reading.
	 A number of editorial changes proposed in response to 15.6.
       Have a viable implementation -- believe it's implementable.

    CA - Made some comments, but want to get document underway.

    UK - Vote to approve draft 15.6 with no comments.

(7) Discussion of Sep-95 SC22 plenary meeeting, which Pitman attended.

    Pitman offered overview of structure of meeting: both national body
    representatives and working group representatives present in one
    meeting. Meeting works by consensus of national bodies; working group
    representatives report but have no direct effect on outcome, except
    through their national bodies.  Output is consensus resolutions.

    Pitman stressed importance of having a representative there to report
    on WG16's state and progress, and optimism that Parquier would be able
    to fulfill this role.

    Pitman explained his understanding of the new procedure for CD and DIS
    voting, which he understood to be taking effect on April 1.

    Parquier explained that this understanding was obsolete and that ISO
    had rejected the proposed discussion of "final CD" and the "up or
    down DIS", and any change is therefore postponed until its amended    
    version is accepted (i.e., a 6 month to 1 year delay after the        
    originally planned implementation in April 1996.)  Therefore the new  
    DIS procedure will not affect WG16.                                   

    Pitman reviewed the Sep-95 resolution of SC22 accepting draft 15.6 as
    effectively a "final CD" (in the terminology that he had been familiar
    with) and explained his belief that, even in spite of the struggle 
    over which rules were to dominate, the group was now ready and strongly
    encouraged by SC22 to register the document as a DIS as soon as proper
    resolution of comments on draft 15.6 was made.

    Pitman discussed the issue of a group web page and suggested WG16
    designate a web page maintainer to keep track of these matters.

(8)

(8.1) Review of voting.  No major discussion.  Everyone seemed familiar
      with the basic structure of what had occurred.

(8.2) Production of responses to National Body comments...

      [All votes, though by national body, were considered informal until 
       confirmed as a block later in the meeting.  When Spain joined the
       meeting mid-way, the convenor permitted the Spanish representative
       to vote on the individual questions for the purpose of broad consensus
       on technical input even though Spain would not be permitted to vote
       in the final resolution.  All parties present agreed that this was
       reasonable. -kmp]

CA-1 -- Work on specific alternate wording needed.  
	Deferred to later in meeting.

CA-2 -- Accepted.  (unanimous vote)

CA-3 -- Accepted.  (unanimous vote)

CA-4 -- After some discussion, proposed a vote on whether to address
	this issue at all.

      JP-Y  US-N  FR-N  CA-Y  UK-N

      But someone suggested adding a cross-reference from the mentioned
      passage to section 1.6, which there was general agreement was a
	good idea as a fallback.

CA-5 -- Defer to later (needs outcome of CA-1).

      Note in mid-page 3 that there's a use of "form" in a situation
      that might not be evaluated.  This is probably a contributing factor
      in the confusion.

CA-6 -- Same issue as FR-4, which proposes a specific resolution.

      Vote on FR-4:

	UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

      Response to CA-6:  the list is complete now

	JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

CA-7 -- Yes, see 4.3 para 1, sentence 2, page 18.

	UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

      Request (by Yuasa) to fix p37 to not refer to CASE and CASE-USING   
	as macros.  General agreement on this point.

CA-7b -- Yes, we'll fix that.

       JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

CA-8 -- Direct CA to wording on p90.
      Add glossary term for "abstract class".

      Deferred until later in meeting when specific wording would 
	be available to review.

CA-9 -- Answer "Yes, sorry." 
	Had been discussed at previous meeting with no action taken.
      This is a deliberate choice.

      UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

CA-10 -- Answer "No bit operations".
       Cannot detect this problem.
       Well, .... mostly.
       Discussion of problem of file I/O being able to detect it.
       Add note in 18.1 on p102 that byte order and bit order is
	  implementation-defined.

       JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

CA-11 -- Ok.

       UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

GE-1 -- A sense that no, this is what "not-an-output-stream" is for -- 
	at least in the specific situation cited in the example.

      Concern that the problem (or a perception of it) might still exist
	even if the example was wrong.  Maybe indicate that the set shown
      is not an exhaustive list.  Maybe cross-reference full list later.

      Deferred until later awaiting a specific rewrite.

GE-2 -- Vote first to change wording:

	 "may" => "must" (and remove "some or")  -- US, ES, CA, UK
	 "may" => "need not"                     -- JP, FR

	More discussion now that wording was changed to say "must".

      Vote on whether to remove paragraph (now amended), effectively
      implementing Germany's original request (though for different
      reasons):

	JP-Remove US-Remove FR-Remove ES-Remove CA-Keep UK-Remove

	Result: The paragraph will be removed as requested.

GE-3 -- Already voted (no objections).

GE-4 -- Remove parenthetical text

      UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

GE-5 -- Add "is"

      JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

GE-6 -- Proposal to use wording like on page 60 for macros, since no one
      complained about that wording.

      No action taken -- deferred until later when specific wording 
      would be available.

LUNCH BREAK

Upon return from lunch, two new working documents (by Pitman) were
available (printed on a single sheet of paper, one document on each side).
These documents were NOT given N-numbers, so their entire content is
included here for reference.  These (hand-written) documents were
proposals for discussion; their presence at this point does NOT signify
acceptance.

  -------------------- Document "Wording Clarifications 1" ----------

  GE-1 1.8.2 Pervasive Error Types

    Most errors are described in detail in the context in which they
    occur.  Some error types are so pervasive throughout the language
    that their detailed descriptions are consolidated here rather
    than repeated in full detail upon each occurrence.
      1.
      2.
      3.
    This list does not exhaust the space of error types.  For a more
    complete list, see section 21.4.

  GE-6 7.2.1 paragraph 3

    During preparation for execution, a DEFMETHOD form must always be
    textually preceded by an appropriate DEFGENERIC form for the 
    generic function to be specialized.

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

  -------------------- Document "Proposed New Terms" ----------

  CA-1    form -- a single, syntactically valid unit of program text;
	   that is, a compound form, an identifier, or a literal.

  CA-1    dynamic -- having an effect that cnanot, in general, be 
	   determined statically and that is determined only through
	   program execution.

	dynamic variable -- a variable whose associated binding
	 is determined by the most recently executed active block
	 that defined it, rather than statically by a lexically
	 apparent block according to the lexical principle.

  CA-1    operator -- the first element of a compound form which is
	 either a reserved name that identifies the form as a
	 special form, or the name of a macro, or else an identifier
	 in the function namespace.

  FR-1    condition -- an object that represents a situation that
	 has been (or might be) detected by a running program.

  CA-8    abstract class -- a class that by nature has no direct
	   instances; for example, such classes might exist for
	   reasons of modularity or broad type discrimination.

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

Continued discussion based on these new documents:

CA-1 --

 Disposition of proposed definition of "form" ...

  UK (Padget): Add xref to section for compound form.

  Removal of second part?
   JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-N (keep) UK-Y

  First part ok?
   UK-Y CA-Abstain ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

 Disposition of proposed definition of "dynamic" ...

  Ito: ``having an effect that is determined only through 
	 program execution and that cannot, in general, be 
	 determined statically.''

    Unanimous acceptance of new wording.

 Disposition of proposed definition of "dynamic variable" ...

  Proposal 1:  As is
  Proposal 2:  Change "defined" to "established"

   UK-2 CA-2 ES-Abstain FR-2 US-2 JP-2

 Change "defined" to "established" in 3.1 para 2 middle of p15
 to match new definition of "dynamic variable"?

   Yes, unanimous agreement.

 Disposition of proposed definition of "operator" ...

  Proposal 1: Add "or a lambda expression".
  Proposal 2: Clarify an identifier in function namespace is a "function identifier"

   [I'm not sure why we voted this in this odd way.  Oh well.
    The heat of the moment, I suppose... -kmp]

   UK-1 US-1 ES-1 JP-2 CA-2 FR-1

FR-1 -- Accept proposed wording as is.

      UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

CA-8 -- In "abstract class", replace "nature" by "definition".
      Remove the example.

      JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

GE-1 -- Remove "throughout the language".

      Unanimous approval.

GE-6 -- "... by the DEFGENERIC form ..."
		---

	Remove "always".

	Discussion of whether this rule is overly restrictive went on for
	a while but reached no conclusion.

	Vote on proposed wording, as amended:

	 UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

FR-2 -- Propose to do the tabular format

	UK-Y CA-N ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

FR-3 -- Note: CPL may include system-dependent classes, so this is 
	really a partial order.

	JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

FR-4 -- done already (see CA-6).

FR-5 -- Instead of the French proposal (do both of):

	  a. Add "in this notation" after parens in para 2 of f-name 
	     on p3.

	  b. Change "were adopted" to "were used" (same page).

	UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

FR-6 -- Three positions voted upon:
       1. Treat the removal as a typo, add back the :boundp mechanism
       2. Create a default-default-value mechanism
       3. Make no mention of boundp

       All 6 (JP,US,FR,ES,CA,UK) wanted position 1.

4:30pm BREAK
4:45pm RESUME

FR-7 -- JP-Y US-Y FR-Y CA-Y UK-Y  [ES not in room]

FR-8 -- UK-Y CA-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

FR-9 -- JP suggests we be more explicit still with something like:
	   "first argument y and second argument x"

	UK-Y CA-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

FR-10 -- Vote on replacement 2 (and also on fixing the "singular/plural"
	 problems in same place) -- unanimous Yes.

FR-11 -- JP-Y US-Y FR-Y CA-Y UK-Y ES-Abstain

FR-12 -- unanimous yes

FR-13 -- already done

FR-14 -- remove "Example:"

       JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

FR-15 -- Yes.  (also, change error in same way)
       Vote: unanimous

FR-16 -- unanimous yes

FR-17 -- UK-Y CA-Abstain ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

FR-18 -- JP-1 US-1 FR-1 ES-1 CA-1 UK-1

FR-19 -- UK-N CA-N ES-N FR-Y US-N JP-N

FR-20 -- US (Pitman) expresses concern about risk of a large addition
	 like this so late in the game.

       Specific issues raised:

	 In 7.1, Pitman wants to remove mention of unused writers set-y 
       and set-z.  Also, in definition of b, change 10,20,30 to 
       100,200,300 so it's more obvious these are not the 10,20,30 from
       above.

       Vote begun (UK-Y CA-Abstain) but cancelled as possibility of
	 bugs became the central topic.

	 Issue--right now we don't have an explicit disclaimer that
	 examples are not binding; if we add one, that might make
	 this safer but might make specification less strong in other
	 areas (like descriptions of EQ and EQL).  Some discussion
	 of adding label to this saying it's non-binding 
	 examples, but that might appear to add increased weight to the 
	 others, which most people probably see right now as slightly less 
	 binding than the text.

       Pitman notices that the examples which have supposedly worked
       in a conforming processor do not show quotation on any of the
       initarg names (:x, etc.) in the create forms.  He wonders if
       there might be other such bugs.

       Discussion of whether providing a complete set of examples is
       a goal.  Consensus: Not a general goal, though plainly a nice
       idea.  Summary: "Not appropriate at this time."

       Vote (on REJECTING all proposed new examples):

       JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

6:00pm (approx) MEETING ADJOURNED TO NEXT DAY

- - - - -

TUESDAY

9:20am Meeting re-convened

       Same attendance as previous day, except that C. Queinnec has 
       joined the French delegation.

       New document N174 distributed (proposed resolutions, by Pitman).
       This document has four parts:  proposed response to Canada, 
       proposed response to France, proposed response to Germany, and
       a list of small editorial changes noticed in the process of other
       work that the editor will be directed to make.

       10 minutes allocated to read it, then open for comments.

       [This is an opportunity to amend the overall document before a final
      vote.  Those items receiving no comment here are assumed in ok shape
      for vote.]

CA-1  -- Canada (Wright) raises the question of whether the definition
       of "form" is sufficient to address CA-5.

       UK (DeRoure) suggest adding "capable of being prepared for execution"
       to the definition of form.

       UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

CA-2  -- no comment
CA-3  -- no comment
CA-4  -- no comment
CA-5  -- no comment
CA-6  -- no comment
CA-7  -- no comment

 >> Add to list of small changes (not part of CA-7 response):
      Don't refer to CASE and CASE-USING as macros on p37 

CA-7b -- no comment
CA-8  -- no comment
CA-9  -- no comment
CA-10 -- no comment
CA-11 -- no comment

GE-1  -- no comment
GE-2  -- Haible had US double-check this but it looks ok.
       no other comment.
GE-3  -- no comment
GE-4  -- no comment
GE-5  -- no comment

FR-1  -- no comment
FR-2  -- no comment
FR-3  --

  FR (Haible): Add something saying this is a partial order--
	      see item 2 under 2.3 on page 13.

  Deferred until specific wording can be developed.

FR-4  -- no comment

FR-5  -- Change "these" => "this" (in proposed response).

FR-6  -- Add "with the parameter profile ((x class-name))"
       in corresponding place to :reader and :writer
       (between "method" and "is").

	 JP-Y US-Y FR-Y ES-Y CA-Y UK-Y

FR-7  -- no comment
FR-8  -- no comment
FR-9  -- no comment
FR-10 -- no comment
FR-11 -- no comment
FR-12 -- no comment
FR-13 -- no comment
FR-14 -- no comment
FR-15 -- no comment
FR-16 -- no comment
FR-17 -- no comment
FR-18 -- no comment
FR-19 -- no comment
FR-20 -- no comment

FR-3  -- [again]

  Specific wording to be voted:

    Editor will add a new item between items 2 and 3, page 13:
     The class precedence list for <NULL> observes the partial
     order <NULL>, <SYMBOL>, <LIST>, <OBJECT>.

  UK-Y CA-Y ES-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

Additional small changes:

 p4 "end in with a -p" => "end in a -p"
    No objection.

 p33 in paragraph 3 of LET, add newline before "Note:"
     No objection.

 Haible:

 pi  Remove blank line between 1.3 and 1.4
     No objection.

 Ito:

 p7   item 14 "An object is immutable if it is not subject to change."
      No objection.

 p117 In continue-condition, change "a condition" to "\it{condition}".
      No objection.

 p118-119

      change "conditions of class <arithmetic-error>"
      => "\it{arithmetic-error} conditions"

      ditto for domain-error, parse-error, simple-error, undefined-entity.

      No objection.

 p91  "an array an array" => "an array"
      No objection.

 p5   In List, change () to nil in 2 places.
      No objection.

 p5   In List, change "element" to "tail" in discussion of List's 
      textual representation.  (Numerous people cringed that this glaring
      editorial error had not been caught much earlier, but all agreed
      it was the right thing.)

FINAL (OFFICIAL) VOTE ON DISPOSITION OF COMMENTS (N174, except last page, 
with other changes voted to CA-1, FR-3, FR-5, and FR-6):

 JP-Y US-Y FR-Y CA-Y UK-Y

 [ES not eligible to vote]

(8.3) Time Schedule

 The editor is requested  to implement the disposition of comments and
 post a new document on an FTP site by April 7.

   Unanimous vote (UK, CA, FR, US, JP)

 Week of 7-14 April is permitted for comments.  If no comment is received,
 consent will be assumed.

 The convenor is requested to forward the document to SC22 between Apr 15-21
 for DIS registration and ballot.

   Unanimous vote (JP, US, FR, CA, UK)

 JP (Yuasa) requests disposition to be made available on electronic media.

 Reserve Nov 8-9 for next ISO meeting.
 Possible sites:
   US (Pitman) volunteers Boston.
   UK (Padget) volunteers Bath.

 Canada (Wright) moves to acknowledge contribution of the Editor (Pitman)
 for his "excellent work".
 No objection.

11:10am BREAK
11:30am RESUME

(9) Status of JTC1 procedures

(9.1) New directives on DIS voting

 Parquier explained that there is no "Final CD" stage yet, its       
 introduction is postponed until the amended new procedure is        
 accepted and implemented (6 month to 1 year delay).  Incidently,    
 one of the minor amendments is to rename DIS as FDIS (Final DIS).   

 No comments.

 Discussion of Electronic Document Distribution

(9.2) The emergence of PAS (Public Available Specifications)

 Doesn't replace fast track.
 Any standards body can submit existing document for standardization.
 PAS source might not be a member body.

(9.3) Conformance to ISO editorial Drafting Rules:
      Paragraph numbering

(10) Miscellaneous

 Web documents

   DeRoure raised issue of webbed version of specification.

   Pitman believes the same information can be published, 
    but it can't be called "the specifciation".

 Designation of Home Page Maintainer

   DeRoure volunteers.  Vote:  UK-Y CA-Y FR-Y US-Y JP-Y

   No centralized FTP hierarchy needed.

 Use plain ASCII when transmitting data by e-mail.

 Verification that all present have web access.

 Pitman moves to thank host (Parquier/ILOG).
 No objection.

12:10 FINAL ADJOURNMENT

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End of ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG16 N177