From dave@revcan.ca Wed May 31 19:18:47 1995 Received: from blackhole.revcan.ca by dkuug.dk with SMTP id AA02220 (5.65c8/IDA-1.4.4j for ); Thu, 1 Jun 1995 05:21:29 +0200 Received: (from uucp@localhost) by blackhole.revcan.ca (8.6.7/8.6.6) id XAA21778 for ; Wed, 31 May 1995 23:15:34 -0400 Received: from hodgson.revcan.ca(142.136.252.250) by internet.revcan.ca via smap (V1.3) id sma021774; Wed May 31 23:15:05 1995 From: David Blackwood X-Mailer: SCO System V Mail (version 3.2) To: csa-cpl@math.uwaterloo.ca, gwarren@vnet.ibm.com, sc22wg15@dkuug.dk Subject: CPWG Motion Re: JTC1 Document Formatting Requirements Date: Wed, 31 May 95 23:18:47 EDT Message-Id: <9505312318.aa07986@hodgson.revcan.ca> X-Charset: ASCII X-Char-Esc: 29 The following motion was recently passed by the Canadian POSIX Working Group and is being forwarded to you for your information and action as requested in the motion. Motion: The Canadian POSIX Working Group strongly objects to the approach taken in the matter of the new JTC1 Electronic Document Formatting requirements (ISO/IEC JTC1 N 3413, ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22 N 1808, ISO/IEC JTC1 N 3284 revised, etc.) because it not only ignores the existence of the POSIX family of standards but also of other ISO standards such as SGML which could more easily and more appropriately have been specified for this requirement. The insistence on the use of the proprietary Microsoft MS-DOS, Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Word for Windows (or Novell WordPerfect for Windows), and Microsoft RTF is considered to be unreasonable, unjustified, and a personal affront to those who have worked on developing vendor independent standards. CPWG asks the CSA/CPL, WG15 and the Canadian representatives to SC22 and JTC1 to protest this decision most strongly and requests that a timetable be established for conversion to SGML and the distribution of a recommended Document Type Definition. A failure by JTC1 to rescind this decision and to respect existing ISO standards would likely result in the withdrawal from the standards process of several of the Canadian technical experts as well as the organizations that they represent. It is also worth noting that Microsoft has been neither a participant nor a contributor to the open systems standards process in Canada, yet this decision will make them a major beneficiary of these efforts. David Blackwood Chairman, Canadian POSIX Working Group Canadian Head of Delegation to ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG15 -- David J. Blackwood Systems Integration Manager Room 1139, 400 Cumberland Street Inter-Office Communications Section Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0L8 Office Communications Division Voice: 613 957-9305 Fax: 613 952-1095 Revenue Canada Internet: dave@revcan.ca