ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG15 (Posix) Meeting, Whistler, Canada
				 October 1994

				Meeting Report



	1. Introduction:

	Seven member bodies were represented at the fourteenth meeting
	of WG15 in Whistler, they were: Canada, Denmark, Germany, Japan,
	the Netherlands, the UK and the USA.  Eighteen delegates were in
	attendance.  This marked a notable improvement on that for the
	previous meeting in Tokyo, Japan.

	The meeting agenda included sixty-five action items together
	with thirty-eight papers for consideration.

	The Plenary was preceded on the 24th and 25th of October by
	meetings of WG15's Rapporteur Groups on:

	    . Internationalisation
	    . Conformance Testing
	    . Profiling Activities


	2. WG15 Plenary
	2.1 JTC1 and SC22 Actions:

	The JTC1 ballot on 13210, project 22.37, equivalent to IEEE PASC
	document P1003.3 has closed and resulted in approval of the work.
	WG15 approved a disposition of comments and these will be passed
	back to JTC1 together with a document revised accordingly and a
	recommendation for immediate publication.

	WG15 considered SC22's recommendations on the 'Guide for POSIX
	National Profiles and National Locales' and produced a revised
	title (Guide for the Development of Profiles for POSIX
	Localization and POSIX <National> Locales) and a revised scope.
	WG15 encouraged IEEE PASC to generate a new PAR corresponding to
	the proposal and to cooperate as closely as possible with WG15
	on the development of the project.


	2.2 WG15 Work Items:

	A number of WG15 work items,
	    22.21.01.01, (Language Independent Specification [LIS]
			  System Interface)
	    22.21.01.03.01 (Transparent File Access [TFA])
	and 22.21.01.03.03 (Protocol Independent Interface [PII]) are
	all approaching their three-year window for producing a draft.
	These should all produce documents within the next six months.

	A fourth work item,
	    22.21.01.03.04 (Directory Services) has a generic version
	which is currently being fast-tracked within ISO: there is
	currently no work in hand to produce a Posix-specific DS
	standard, and it is likely that the WG15 will request that the
	work item be withdrawn.


	2.3 Posix IEEE/ISO Synchronisation Plan:

	Denmark continues to have problems with the WG15/IEEE PASC
	synchronisation plan.

	Two issues were identified:
		. the process of handling comments in the voting
		  process.
		. whether the synch plan manages the process correctly
		  and adequately.
	Denmark offered to establish an email list to discuss the
	revision of the synchronisation plan.  The results of the
	discussion are to be presented to the next meeting of WG15.


	2.4 UK Concerns:

	The 'Comprehensive Test Methods' NP, originally suggested by the
	UK, has been distributed to other ISO JTC1 SCs for comment,
	following the September meeting of SC22.  None has been
	forthcoming as yet.

	The UK presented a paper on Application Conformance, airing a
	concern voiced by user representatives that the POSIX standards
	offered little to guarantee application suitability for POSIX
	platforms.  During the debate it was suggested that ANDF (the
	Architecture Neutral Distribution Format proposal) may provide a
	mechanism for 'pseudo' binary portability.  The debate ended
	with an action on WG15's Member Bodies to review the UK paper
	and provide any feedback for consideration at the next WG15
	meeting.

	The UK abstained in the vote on WG15 resolution 94-285 which
	recommended the 'PDTR 14252 "Guide to POSIX OSE" for DTR
	Registration' since its expert had not had opportunity to see
	and comment on the proposed disposition of comments to 14252.
	These had been distributed by email only three working days
	before the WG15 meeting.  In this case there is no anticipated
	problem - the UK has individuals who participated in the IEEE
	group which developed the standard and also within the WG15
	rapporteur group dealing with its ISO progress - however this
	highlights a more general concern with the ISO disposition of
	comments procedure, which may have to be held out of the normal
	cycle of WG meetings, and which could extensively revise a draft
	which the majority of balloters had approved without comment:
	they sign a blank cheque to a minority balloter.


	3. UK Delegation:

	The UK delegation consisted of:
		David Cannon	UK BSI IST/5/-/15 Convenor, PUKE
		Martin Kirk


	David Cannon
	28-Oct-1994