Subject: WG11/N341 - Minutes of October 1992 Meeting

From: Willem Wakker <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 09 Nov 92 16:33:16 N

DRAFT MINUTES OF MEETING		   SC22/WG11/N341 r1

Committee:   ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG11

Place:	     AFNOR, Tour Europe
	     Paris La Defense

Date:	     October 12 - 16, 1992

Attendees:   Mr. Ed Barkmeyer	   NIST, USA
	     Mr. Ken Edwards	   IBM, USA
	     Mr. Brian Meek	   King's College London, UK
	     Mr. Paul Rabin	   OSF, USA
	     Mr. Craig Schaffert   DEC, USA (Liaison WG15)
	     Mr. Joe Treat	   Netwise, USA
	     Mr. Willem Wakker	   ACE, Netherlands
Members SC21/WG8/RPC:
	     Ms. Josee Auber	   HP, France
	     Mr. Mark Hamilton	   Netwise, USA
	     Mr. Alistair Munro    Bristol University, UK
	     Mr. Dave Robinson	   DEC, UK
Observers:
	     Mr. Jean Bourgain	   France
	     Mr. Montagutelli	   France

1.  Agenda (WG11/N322)

The following additions were made to the draft agenda:

  1.  Point 2.b: document number is WG11/N334

  2.  Point 5.c: WG11 document number is N332

  3.  Point 6.b: add document WG11/N317R: CLIPCM WD#5.1

  4.  Point 7.b: add document WG11/N319R: CLID WD#6.1

It was noted that Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning
were reserved for a combined meeting with SC21/WG8/RPC.

Professor Kulisch (Universitaet Karlsruhe) had asked be be
allowed to present work on computer arithmetic.  His
presentation was scheduled for Tuesday morning.

The agenda was adopted as amended.

It was agreed that the order of business in the draft agenda
would not be followed, but each item would be discussed at
the most suitable time, considering the simultaneous
meetings with the RPC group.

2.  Minutes of Previous Meeting (WG11/N315)

No changes were made to the minutes of the September 1992
meeting; the minutes were approved.

Also, the report on the interim meeting in Tampere in August
1992 (WG11/N334) was approved unchanged.

3.  Convenor Report

The following issues were reported:

  1.  The decline in membership of WG11 continues to be a
      point of attention.  The active member from Germany
      has no longer funding to attend meetings (and hence
      Germany was not represented).

  2.  SC22 has established an Ad Hoc group to investigate
      issues concerning cross-language standards, and should
      propose a policy in these matters to SC22 before the
      next plenary.  To obtain all the necessary
      information, a questionnaire has been produced which
      will be completed by each convenor.

  3.  Document SC22/N1192 (more precisely the SGFS version
      of this document) on the copyright notification in DIS
      and IS documents was brought to the attention of the
      project editors.

  4.  At the SC22 Plenary, the conveners were reminded that
      according to the JTC1 directives, National Bodies
      should inform the convenor about the members in the
      delegation to a WG meeting.

4.  National Activity Reports

4.1  BSI IST/5/11, Report by Brian Meek

The UK panel has continued to be active mainly through
electronic mail.  A meeting on 1 July was held jointly with
the parent committee IST/5 for a presentation by Brian
Wichmann on LIA, and which also discussed Roger Scowen's
critique of CLID.  A panel meeting scheduled for
29 September was postponed and will probably take place in
November by which time CLID 6.1 and CLIP 5.1 will have been
circulated for discussion.  Meanwhile UK members of IFIP 2.5
are continuing to repeat concerns about LIA despite attempts
to answer them and explain what WG11 is doing, and people
have been encouraged to write to IST/5 with reservations.
This may also be discussed at the November meeting, and
perhaps IST/5 meeting in December.

In May, Brian Meek gave a presentation on WG11 to the DECUS
UK symposium, and has since submitted it for wider
publication.

4.2  ANSI X3T2, Report by Ken Edwards

At the September X3T2 meeting, work was done to align the
CLIP and RPC definitions.  Some of the CLIP definition were
changed in what resulted as WD#5.1 while suggested changes
to the RPC text were included in X3T2's comments on the RPC
2nd CD ballot.

In regards to the LIA-1, X3T2 now has two new members with a
specific interest in the LIA-1 development.  X3T2 has also
decided to post on the numeric forums a guide for commenting
on the LIA-1 during the anticipated public review.  It is
X3T2's intent to also provide ANSI with a cover letter for
the public review that states the method in which comments
should be submitted for consideration.

4.3  AFNOR/CG 97/CN 22/GE 11

No report was received.

4.4  DIN

No report was received.

5.  Work Item 22.14 - Language Bindings Guidelines

The document was balloted in JTC1 (JTC1/N1818).  This ballot
had resulted in comments from Austria, Canada and Italy
(JTC1/N2018, WG11/N332).

Draft responses were discussed and agreed.  All the agreed
changes to the document are of editorial nature.  The
project editor will prepare a new draft for publication by
ISO.

Milestones for the Language Bindings Guidelines project:

5.3   92-12   TR published

6.  Work Item 22.16 - Common Procedure Calling Mechanism

During the discussions with the RPC group, alignment with
the RPC documents in numerous places was agreed.  Sometimes
this implies changes in the CLIPCM document, sometimes this
resulted in proposed changes to the RPC document.  As the
latter document is currently under ballot, it was agreed
that WG11 should propose these changes to the RPC document
in a liaison statement to SC21/WG8/RPC.  This liaison
statement will then be discussed at the editing meeting of
the RPC group.

The following decisions were also taken:

  1.  The title of the document will be: "Language-
      Independent Procedure Calling", acronym: "LIPC".

  2.  LIPC will adopt the IDN notation from the datatypes
      document.

  3.  LIPC will include the datatype descriptions from the
      datatypes document.

  4.  A number of editorial changes will be applied to bring
      the document in line with the other documents.

A new version will be produced by the editor in time so that
this document can be send to SC22 for CD registration
ballot, and that the resulting comments can be discussed at
the next WG11 meeting in April 1993.

Milestones for the LIPC project:

2.8   92-10   WD approved for registration as CD

7.  Work Item 22.17 - Language-Independent Data Types

An interim document (WD 6.1) was available at the meeting.
This document was an version updated in accordance with the
decisions taken at the August 1992 meeting.  Further changes
were agreed (so that for instance all the outstanding issues
are resolved), and the editor will prepare a new version of
the document to be circulated as 2nd draft to SC22.  The aim
is to ensure that the ballot on this draft closed before the
next WG11 meeting.

The convener will check with SC22 secretariat whether
contact points can/may be added to the documents.

It was decided to change the title of the document to
"Language-Independent Datatypes", acronym "LID".

Milestones for the LID project:

2.8   91-01   WD approved for registration as CD
3.0   91-05   CD registered
3.1   91-05   CD study initiated
3.8   93-04   CD approved for registration as DIS

8.  Work Item 22.28 - Language-Independent Arithmetic, Part
    1: Integer and Floating Point Arithmetic

CD 10967-1.2 is out for ballot (SC22/N1263), closing date
early February 1993 [NOTE: actual closing date: 1993-01-28].

It was noted that there is still the concern by groups of
numerical analysts that LIA may condone arithmetic that is
perceived to be "weaker" than IEEE 754.  The only way to
satisfy these opponents of LIA is to completely withdraw
LIA, or the recast LIA to a IEEE 754 binding.  Also, signs
were received that awareness was raised on these issues at
NB level, which may result in unresolvable NO votes during
the ballot.
Therefore, it was decided to provide the SC22 NBs with
information regarding these issues, and explaining the WG11
position [WG11/N342].

Milestones for the LIA Part 1 project:

3.8   93-04   CD approved for registration as DIS

9.  Work Item 22.33 - Language-Independent Arithmetic, Part
    2: Language Independent Mathematical Procedure Standard

A first skeleton document was available (N335), and a number
of questions from the editors (annex to N335) were
discussed.

Milestones for the LIA Part 2 project:

2.1   91-09   WD study initiated
      93-04   First draft circulated
2.8   94-02   WD draft for CD registration

10.  Work Item 22.34 - Language-Independent Arithmetic, Part
     3: Language	 Independent Complex Arithmetic and
     Procedure Standard

Due to the work on LIA part 1 and the resulting delay for
LIA Part 2, the milestones for Part 3 were shifted.

Milestones for the LIA Part 3 project:

2.1   91-09   WD study initiated
      94-05   First draft circulated
2.8   94-10   WD draft for CD registration

11.  Cross language issues

11.1  POSIX

In reaction to the liaison statement from WG11 to WG15
(N316), the U.S. member body in WG15 is investigating what
to do about the proposal for a ISO TR, based on the TCOS LI
TR (N284).  Informal contacts with the WG15 convener have
led to the conclusion that there is indeed an interest to
have such a TR, but that it is unclear which WG should
propose and produce the document.

The convener stated that WG11 could undertake such a
project, under the provision that 'the project comes with a
project editor'.

The WG11 convener has informed IEEE of the possible use of
the IEEE report as a basis for an ISO TR.  [In the meantime,
IEEE has answered that there is no problem in using that
document as the basis for an ISO TR.]

A draft NWI proposal was produced (N338); it was left to the
WG11 and WG15 conveners to decide who will propose the NWI
to SC22.

11.2  PCTE

There was nothing to report on PCTE.

11.3  IRDS

There was nothing to report on IRDS.

12.  Planning and Future Meetings

The next meeting will be in the Boston area on April 26-30
1993, hosted by DEC/OSF.  This will be a meeting parallel
with an SC21/RPC editing meeting.

It will be investigated to have an interim editing meeting
to further discuss the responses on the ballots on LID, LIPC
and LIA-1.  This interim meeting (tentatively scheduled for
end of July 1993 in Amsterdam) is subject to cancellation
after the April 1993 meeting.  The fall 1993 meeting will be
held in London.

   - First meeting 1993

     Date:	  April 26-30, 1993
     Place:	  Boston area (DEC/OSF)
     Status:	  Date and place confirmed

   - Second meeting 1993

     Date:	  July 19-23 [or 26-29] 1993
     Place:	  Amsterdam (ACE)
     Status:	  Date to be confirmed
		  Subject to cancellation after April 1993 meeting

   - Third meeting 1993

     Date:	  October 25-29 1993
     Place:	  London (BSI)
     Status:	  Date and place confirmed

Documents identified since last mailing

___________________________________________________________________________________________
WG11   Other	    Date     Author	 Title
Nbr    Nbrs
___________________________________________________________________________________________
318		    9205xx   Payne	 2nd CD 10967-1
319		    9206xx   Barkmeyer	 CLID WD 6
320		    9206xx   Barkmeyer	 Responses to comments
321		    9207xx   Wakker	 WG11 Convenor Report to SC22
322		    9208xx   Wakker	 Draft Agenda October 1992 meeting
323    SC21/N7010   92xxxx		 Liaison Statement from SC21 to SC22/WG11
324		    9208xx   IST/5/11	 Comments to N309
325		    9208xx   Meek	 Problems with Language Bindings
326		    920812   LIA ed.	 Possible Language Bindings for LIA-1
327		    920816   Scowen	 LIA and Prolog
328    CD11578-1    9208xx		 RPC: Part 1 - Model
329    CD11578-2    9208xx		 RPC: Part 2 - IDN
330		    9208xx   Meek	 Programming Languages: Towards Greater Commonality
331		    920813   Yellin	 Comments on CLIP N317
332    JTC1/N1208   9208xx		 JTC1 Vote on DTR 10182
333		    9208xx   Treat	 Informal report on SC21 RPC
334		    920823   Meek	 Report on Tampere WG11 Meeting
335		    9210xx   Payne	 LIA-2 WD 0.0 + 2 annexes
336		    9210xx   Hoff	 How children compute numbers
337		    92xxxx   X3T2	 Response to N299
338		    9210xx   WG11	 NWI proposal Guidelines for LI service specs
339		    9210xx   IEEE	 Approval to use IEEE TCOS guide
340		    9210xx   WG11	 Responses to comments on DTR 10182 (JTC1/N1208)
341		    9211xx   Wakker	 Minutes WG11 Meeting October 1992
342		    9211xx   WG11	 Information to SC22 MBs on LIA-1
343		    9210xx		 Presentation Prof Kulisch (Paris, Oct 92)

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