Report of April X3L8 Special Interest Group Meeting

Meeting Notes

X3L8 Special Interest Group Meeting

Held at the National Institute of Standards and Technology

December 12 and 13, 1996

Attendees:

Bruce Bargmeyer, Environmental Protection Agency

Alan Goldfine, National Institute of Standards and Technology

Henry Heffernan, EDPNS

Bill Kenworthey, Self

Joe Leahy, Science Applications International Corporation

Doug Mann, Pacific Northwest Laboratory

Rudy Marik, Synetics Corporation

John McCarthy, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory

Judith Newton, National Institute of Standards and Technology

Phong Ngo, Science Applications International Corporation

Peter D. Noerdlinger, Applied Research Corp.

Frank Olken, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory

Burton Parker, Paladin Integration Engineering

Andy Schoka (sp), Mitretek Systems

David Stowell, Stowell Associates

Judith Newton chaired the meetings.

The following reports the issues raised and decisions made:

1. Discussion of NATO data standards efforts

Rudy Marik gave a presentation describing data standards efforts in NATO. Bert Parker gave a presentation about the X3L8 and SC14 standards this group is working on. The NATO Industrial Advisory Group/Subgroup 52, and its predecessor groups, has worked to develop and apply data standards. Their work has much in common with the work of X3L8. We discussed the areas of mutual interest, existing and proposed standards, and described the approaches that are proving useful.

2. JTC1 Reorganization

We discussed the status of the reorganization. Over five SC14 member bodies have affirmed that they will actively participate in several SC14 projects. The JTC1 meeting is taking place this week, so nothing new is known about the outcome.

3. Standards forum for data standards

Regardless of the outcome of the JTC1 reorganization effort, this is a good opportunity for the X3L8 members to assess how to best progress our work. The ANSI/ISO forum has many known advantages. However, two major problems in the ANSI/ISO forum which do not seem to be addressed in the current reorganization effort are the difficulty in freely circulating documents and the difficulty for individuals around the world to directly participate in standards development (without participation in intermediary committees). The reasons are well understood for the ANSI/ISO prohibition against free document circulation and the ANSI/ISO required organizational structures that must be in place and active before individuals may participate in the technical development of standards. We discussed other standards development organizations and the relative advantages and disadvantages of each.

4. Time Standard

Burt Parker presented a draft of the SD3 for the Representation of Time for Information Interchange standard. Several suggestions were made for changes. Burt will prepare a new version.

5. Metadata Standards and Registries Workshop

We reviewed new drafts of the call for participation in the workshop. We worked to focus the workshop on producing practical input for metadata registration. We want participants to actively engage our standards and a reference implementation of a data registry prior to participating in the workshop. The next step is to finalize arrangements with program committee members. We also discussed potential sponsors for the workshop. The call for participation can be viewed at URL: http://www.lbl.gov/~olken/EPA/Workshop/

6. Status of Part 1, Part 2, DVD, Metamodel

We discussed the status of these pending standards proposals. SC14 will send ISO/IEC 11179 Parts 1 & 2 out for CD ballot. Judith sent a NWI to the SC14 Secretariat for balloting. We need to complete the dictionary to further progress the Metamodel for the Management of Shareable Data.

7. Teleconference equipment for meetings

We will try to arrange for teleconference equipment at all future meetings so that out of town people can attend by phone. Before each meeting, we will send out notice of the telephone number to call.

8. Holiday party

The meeting was adjourned a bit early so that members could get their spouses and attend the holiday party at the Tivoli restaurant. Many thanks to Bill Kenworthey for making the many arrangements. The party was a great success and was enjoyed by all.

6. Future meeting schedule

X3L8 SIG meeting January 23 & 24, 1997, NIST North room 501

X3L8 SIG meeting February 26 & 27, 1997 and X3L8 Plenary February 28 at Battelle

X3L8 SIG meeting March 12 & 13, 1997 at NIST

Directions to NIST North: NIST North is Building 820. The address of this building is 820 West Diamond Avenue. Note that the building is located across the street from the main campus of NIST. Instead of turning onto Bureau Drive toward the main Gate of NIST, turn the opposite direction (North) onto Bureau Drive and take the second possible right turn to get to the NIST North building, The building has the name "NIST" on it in large letters. (From Interstate 270, driving North, take Exit 10, which loops under the freeway, and then turn RIGHT at the first stop light--this is the intersection of West Diamond Avenue and Bureau drive.)

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X3L8 documents, including this meeting report, are available via Anonymous FTP from speckle.ncsl.nist.gov. Change directory to X3L8 (X3L8 in lower case letters) and check the "readme" file for details. Many of the documents are also listed on the X3L8 Home Page http://www.lbl.gov/~olken/X3L8