CEN/TC304 N974
From: Þorgeir Sigurðsson [thorgeir@stri.is]
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2001 5:47 AM
Subject: (CEN/TC304 N974)
Minutes of 17th plenary 2001 23 February
Dear TC304 member
Minutes of
the February 2001 plenary of TC304.
http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N974.html
Yours sincerely /Þorgeir, secretary of CEN/TC304
Title/Subject: Minutes of 17th plenary 2001 23 February
Source: Secretary of CEN/TC304
Date: 20 March 2001
Minutes of 17th plenary of CEN/TC304, 23 February 2001
The plenary was held 23 February following an open meeting 22 February held
by CEN/ISSS and PriceWaterhouseCoopers to validate the report in N966 Cultural
Diversity Study with a TC304-specific assessment report in N971 tabled in the
plenary meeting. (see: http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N966.pdf and http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N971.pdf
)
1
2
The following delegates and national bodies attended the
meeting, fully or in part. When more than one name is given the first name is
that of the Head of delegation (Hod):
Elzibieta Broma-Wrzesien on behalf of the Polish NSO,
Erkki Kolehmainen (Hod) and Dr V. S Umamaheswaran on behalf of the Finnish
National Standard Organistion (NSO),
Erkki Kolehmainen also held a proxy on behalf the Irish NSO,
Evangelos Melagrakis on behalf of the Greek NSO,
Gerhard Budin on behalf of the Austrian NSO,
Gintautas Grigas on behalf of the Lithuanian NSO,
Karl Ivar Larsson (Hod), Monica Ståhl and Göran Tellström on behalf of the
Swedish NSO,
Keld Simonsen on behalf of the Norwegian NSO,
Paul Dettmer (Hod) and Marc Wilhelm Küster on behalf of the German NSO,
Yves Neuville on behalf of the French NSO,
James Boyd strategy manager of CEN/ISSS
Chair of TC304: Wolf Arfvidson from Statskonteret, Sweden
Secretary of TC304: Þorgeir Sigurðsson from STRI Iceland.
Þorgeir clarified in a response to an enquiry from Keld Simonsen that the
secretary was not representing the Icelandic NSO.
3
The agenda was adopted with changes suggested by the chair
as reflected in these minutes. Gerhard Budin asked why there were no
liaison reports on the agenda and was given the reply that none had been
submitted.
4
Keld Simonsen, Erkki Kolehmainen, Karl Ivar Larsson and the
TC secretary were appointed to the Resolution Drafting Committee that was to
meet after lunch and have resolutions prepared for adoption.
5
The minutes of the last meeting in http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N956.html
were adopted with a complaint from Keld Simonsen that more text was needed in
minutes than just a list of resolutions with an attendance list and a few notes
on some of the resolutions. Erkki Kolehmainen said these minutes were based on
a liaison report that he had written to JTC1/ SC2 with a few notes added. The
secretary confirmed this, yet stated that essential information from the
plenary was encapsulated in this report but promised that the minutes of the
present meeting would be more informative.
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a)
Wolf Arfvidson presented slides he
had written, giving an overview of the Work of TC304. http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N969.html.
In the discussion following this presentation, Marc Küster and other delegates
complained over the one-sided stop of payments for contracted work (see resolution
9 of the 16th plenary in N956)
b)
Sweden had produced a report on a
possible EN1923 revision in accordance with resolution 6 of the 16th plenary
see N956). (See N957 in http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N957.pdf and a
follow-up in N968 in http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N968.pdf). The
secretary stated that the process of reclassifying a standard as an ENV as
asked for in that resolution was unheard of, but if the standard was revised it
could be revised into an ENV. In a discussion on this report Dr Umamaheswaran
and Göran Tellström stated that it would be the wrong message to send to
implementers, if a revision of this standard led them to the believe that its
technology was up-to-date. Marc Küster said he wanted a disclaimer in the
pre-standard stating that no new systems should be implemented using this
technology. Evangelos Melagrakis said it was a bad practice not to give
guidance to implementers on transition (period) to a newer technology. This
discussion was inconclusive and was postponed until after lunch when a
resolution on the subject was to be adopted.
c)
A vote on the Taxonomy document was discussed (see N960, N961 and the ballot result in N965 in http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N965.html.
Erkki Kolehmainen stated on behalf
of the Irish NSO that its vote was negative and not positive as stated in N965.
In spite of the many negative votes, the editor Keld Simonsen said that most of
the objections could be accommodated and work should be continued. Erkki
Kolehmainen said that the Taxonomy draft had been for discussion in every
plenary meeting for years and the editor had not used the many opportunities to
make the changes needed. Discussions followed on separating the right hand side
of the table from the left-hand side and leave it out. Evangelos Melagrakis
said there were problems with the left-hand side of the table to do with
phonetic transliterations. Marc Küster objected to any plans of making the
document more visible than it already was as a TC document. Erkki Kolehmainen
proposed that any further work be halted until the consequences of the
PriceWaterhouseCoopers report in N971 had been seen.
d)
Marc Küster told of comments received to N962 and presented a revised document in N970 see http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N970.pdf
Delegates in the plenary gave only
positive comments and Erkki Kolehmainen proposed a resolution for accepting the
document. Göran Tellström started a discussion on who should receive the
recommendations of the report that needed money and people external to
standardisation. The availability of the document to outsiders and the need to
distribute it was discussed. Evangelos Melagrakis praised the report but said
he missed a page summarizing the results. Marc Küster said that it had always
been the intention to provide such a summary into the delivered final document.
A resolution was prepared that summarized this discussion.
e)
It was noted that the Eurolocale WS
had produced its CWA deliverable but the process of creating an ENV out of it
and of registering it in the European and ISO cultural registries had not been
started. There were discussions that if the CWA was turned into a prestandard
ENV, its notation in part II would need to be changed. There seemed however to
be consensus that only part I needed to be turned into an ENV and this was to
be stated in a resolution, but the older resolution of registering the CWA
parts into the Cultural Registries was iterated in the discussion but not
repeated in a resolution.
f)
The delegates noted the OCR-B report in N964 without any
comments (see http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N964.pdf)
Karl Ivar Larsson, the co-editor of that report said a final report for adoption
would become available in April 2001 to be followed by a TC304 draft for an
OCR-B EN(V) (including the Euro sign). He also informed that ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 2
in its latest Plenary (September 2000) adopted a resolution that ISO/IEC JTC
1/SC 31 should take over the responsibility for JTC 1 OCR standards (ISO 1073
and 1831). The matter will be discussed in the forthcoming SC 31 Plenary 15-16
May, which he will attend. Parallell processing of the OCR-B EN(V) and an JTC 1
(SC 31?) 1073-II revision will then also be considered. No resolution was asked
for.
g)
Under this agenda item, other Work Items of TC304 and their status were discussed briefly even if no specific documents had been prepared on any of them:
The plenary noted that the Keyboard report had been finalized, even if payments had been halted to the Project Team. The plenary noted that the European Ordering Prestandard ENV 13710 had been published but unfortunately without any non-Latin-1 letters, a situation that must be corrected. The plenary noted that resolution 7 of the previous plenary containing an action item on the secretary to add text to the Fallback draft and complete it as a CEN report had not been completed. Erkki Kolehmainen said that this should not entail much work and volunteered to assist the secretary in writing the necessary text.
The status and future of the project team assisting NSOs in preparing locale specifications Populating the Cultural Registry received much discussion. The delegates seemed to be of the opinion that it was unfortunate that the effort of this Project Team had not born fruit in any actual registrations and the TC-304 secretary stated that the previous resolutions of asking him to seek proxies from NSOs for doing this was not a workable solution.
The plenary noted that the ESR workshop had been finished and no workshop originating from the TC304 workprogram was now operating. A resolution #9 on the output of the ESR workshop was prepared.
.
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The document from
PriceWaterhouseCoopers in N966 Cultural Diversity Study was discussed and the
document with TC304-specific assessments in N971 (see: http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N966.pdf
and http://www.stri.is/TC304/DOCS/N971.pdf
) Most of the delegates had attended the open meeting the day before when N966
was discussed but N971 was tabled in the TC-plenary and had not been seen
before by the delegates.
8
Document N971 contains three recommendations including that TC304 be
disbanded after finishing the ongoing OCR-B work. Most delegates in the plenary
objected to this recommendation. Gerhard Budin from Austria said that he was
against the methodology of the report and of receiving it without any warning
in the plenary. Others stated that it was too political and too small sample of
organizations had been consulted. James Boyd said he had expected comments and
objections to the report and it was now for the TC to voice its concerns.
Þorgeir and Dr Umamaheswaran both pointed out that it was not only the OCR-B
that was ongoing and some work had been finished that had been previously
halted. Yves Neuville stated the French position that they were much against
closing TC304 for among other the reason that it would be very difficult to
re-activate. Marc Küster on behalf of Germany rejected the political angle
implied by the report that standardization should be free of. Evangelos
Melagrakis proposed that a calm and impartial response should be prepared by a
small Ad-Hoc group set up by the TC. It should prepare two things, first:
corrections to the PWC report and second a self-assessment of the TC.
James Boyd explained to the delegates that a small group would be set up by
CEN/ISSS to prepare a response to the PWC report. It would be unlikely that it
would deliver until September and a response from TC304 or its Ad hoc group
could deliver its response to this group.
Keld Simonsen on behalf of Norway supported the idea of an Ad-Hoc but
criticised the PWC report and its market survey for being too small. Elzibieta
Broma-Wrzesien on behalf of the Polish NSO said it was too easy just to disband
the TC and she agreed with France that alternatives should be sought. Gintautas
Grikas of Lithuania agree with this and said additionally that he missed users
and consumers in the PWC report to be taken into account.
Karl Ivar Larsson on behalf of Sweden stated that it was important to keep the
competence present in TC304 and supported Ad-Hoc group being set up. Göran
Tellström of Sweden and Microsoft said that from industries point of view both
short and long term goals need to be kept in mind and these needed short and
long-lived structures.
9
The following resolutions were
adopted. (They are also given in document N972)
#1 Þorgeir Sigurðsson
TC304 wishes to thank Þorgeir Sigurðsson for his excellent work as the
secretary of CEN/TC304 and wishes him well in his future endeavours.
Acclamation
Notes from the discussion: Evangelos Melagrakis proposed that an action item
was put on the chair to prepare a "certificate" that stated the
above. This proposal was well received.
#2 Johan van Wingen
TC304 regrets the accident that has prevented Johan van Wingen from the
Netherlands from participating in this plenary meeting and wishes him a speedy
recovery.
Unanimous
Notes from the discussion: Johan van Wingen had been taken to a hospital the
day before after falling in a meeting.
#3 EN1923
CEN/TC 304 states as its intention to perform a revision of EN 1923 (as an
ENV). It also accepts the offer of the Swedish member body to provide an
editor, to produce a revision proposal based on the draft document CEN/TC304
N968. The main intention with this revision is to publicise the availability of
the 8859-15 code table and other changes to the 8859 series and this is to be
stated in the foreword.
This resolution was adopted with 7 positive votes of: Austria, Finland, France,
Germany, Greece, Norway and Sweden
Ireland voted against
There was no abstention.
Notes from the discussion: This resolution and its text were the result of long
discussion aiming at a consensus of all those present (Ireland voted by a
proxy) on how to justify the revision and how this should be stated. (See a
previous agenda item on the subject).
#4 Taxonomy
TC304 notes that the letter ballot on the proposed taxonomy in N961 has
failed as such mainly due to the controversiality of the right hand side of the
table. As the subject area will be addressed at the CEN/ISSS level as part of
the eEurope initiative as a result of the Cultural Diversity Study conducted by
PWC, TC304 resolves to wait for further guidance from ISSS.
Unanimous
Notes from the discussion: See previous agenda item on the subject.
#5 Matching
TC304 accepts the study on Matching in document N962 (revised version)
together with the forthcoming summary on recommended actions to be prepared by
the editor and resolves to have it openly available at the TC304 web-site.
TC304 further resolves to send the document to CEN/ISSS as an input for the
action plan being prepared as result of the Cultural Diversity Study. TC304
wishes to thank the Matching Project Team for its work.
Unanimous
See previous agenda item for discussion on the subject.
#6 Eurolocale
TC304 notes that the CWA 14051-1 and -2 on Eurolocale have been published
and resolves to make part one of the CWA an ENV depending on the feedback from
the SC22 registration ballot. TC304 wishes to thank the Eurolocale Project Team
for its work.
Unanimous
Notes on the discussion: See previous agenda item on the subject. It is
implied in this resolution that a previous resolution on registering the CWA in
the SC22 Cultural registry is carried out.
#7 Keyboard Report
TC304 notes that the Keyboard report has been submitted to CEN /BT for
acceptance for publication as a CEN report and wishes to thank the Keyboard
Project Team for its work.
Unanimous
Notes on the discussion. It was noted that payments to the PT had been halted
but this work had nevertheless been finished and this work should be listed
among those tasks that the Commission allowed to be paid for.
#8 EOR
TC304 thanks the Project Team for the successful completion of ENV 13710
European Ordering Rules.
Unanimous
Notes on the discussion. No text was put in the resolution on the mistake in
the printing of this prestandard (only Latin-1 letters) but it was understood
that this mistake must be corrected by CEN.
#9 ESR Submittal
TC304 notes that the CWA 14094 on European Culturally Specific ICT
Requirements (ESR) has been published and resolves to send it to ISO/IEC JTC1
SC22/WG20 as an input for the revision of the Cultural Registry Standard and
also to send it to CEN/ISSS as an input for the action plan being prepared as
result of the Cultural Diversity Study. TC304 wishes to thank the ESR Project
Team for its work.
Unanimous
Notes from the discussion: The ESR CWA contains ideas on how to expand the
Cultural Registry concept, which has been the key to TC304 standardisation
work. It was therefore seen as very appropriate to forward the ESR CWA to these
two bodies.
#10 Population of the Cultural Registry
CEN/TC304 recognizes that the information collected by the Project Team
from some of the NSOs for the Cultural Registry is of considerable value and
should be utilised although the work of the PT has been halted. An Ad-Hoc group
led by the chair will be set up for this purpose.
Unanimous
#11 Cultural Diversity Study
CEN/TC304 notes the Cultural Diversity Study made by PWC and encourages its
members to study it and send comments to the PriceWaterhouseCoopers Project
Team well before 9th of March
when a final report is to become available, with a copy to the CEN/ISSS,
attention of James Boyd.
Unanimous
Notes from the discussion: This resolution was for individual TC members to
carry out.
#12 Ad-Hoc on Cultural Diversity Study
CEN/TC304 resolves to set up an Ad-Hoc group to comment on the PWC Cultural
Diversity Study and for making a future self-assessment for TC304 for
submission to the steering group to be set up by CEN/ISSS.
Unanimous
Action item for this purpose on the chair to assemble input from Gerhard
Budin, Erkki Kolehmainen, V. S.Umamaheswaran (at a later stage), Göran
Tellström, Marc Küster, Karl Ivar Larsson, Þorgeir Sigurðsson
#13 Thanks to Host
TC304 wishes to thank James Boyd of CEN/ISSS for attending large part of
the TC304 meeting and for use of the facilities at the CEN meeting centre.
Unanimous
Notes from the discussion. No representative from the Commission or the
PriceWaterhouseCoopers team was present in any part of the plenary.
#14 Future meeting
Older tentative meeting dates were cancelled but a new tentative meeting
date was put at 14-15 June 2001 in Brussels.
Unanimous
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Thorgeir Sigurdsson
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