maxtal@physics.su.OZ.AU (John Max Skaller) writes:

> Well, you could migrate to Australia, and become a
>Technical Expert to WG21 (the ISO C++ committee) and then you'd
>get an electronic copy of the Working Paper for nothing. :-)

Worked for me! ;-)

--
Fergus Henderson - fjh@munta.cs.mu.oz.au

Hello,
can anybody give me a name of a ftp-site where I can get the
latest draft?

thanks a lot, hermann


-----------------------------------------------------------------
Hermann Zirknitzer   (v) ++43-732-7090-389
c/o KEBA GmbH    (email) zirk@keba.co.at
Gewerbepark Urfahr   (f) ++43-732-70910
A-4040 Linz

> >    Tracking the working paper is a major commitment, and anyone
> >    willing to put in sufficient effort to be able to make constructive
> >    contributions is - for good and bad - assumed to be willing and
> >    able to be a member.
> >
> > Except for students. I've asked a couple of times if there was a way
> > for students to get copies of the WP without paying the full $600
> > membership which is a bit out of reach for most of us.

 Well, you could migrate to Australia, and become a
Technical Expert to WG21 (the ISO C++ committee) and then you'd
get an electronic copy of the Working Paper for nothing. :-)

--
        JOHN (MAX) SKALLER,         INTERNET:maxtal@suphys.physics.su.oz.au
 Maxtal Pty Ltd,
        81A Glebe Point Rd, GLEBE   Mem: SA IT/9/22,SC22/WG21
        NSW 2037, AUSTRALIA     Phone: 61-2-566-2189

In article <36tc39$rbu@ixnews1.ix.netcom.com>, PGoodwin@ix.netcom.com (Phil Goodwin) writes:
|>
|> Sound like this topic has been well hashed outside of this forum, so I
|> hope that I am not sounding a boring or redundant note, but: it seems
|> to me that electronic publishing need not be free, and could in fact
|> help to finance the commitee...
|>
I think this is a good idea.  I have purchased stuff on the Internet with
my credit card already, so this is established practice.

Is there somebody who could suggest this possiblity to the relevent bodies?

|> <Snip>
|> If a dial-up password protected service were established, then the
|> passwords could be exchanged for credit-card numbers. Users could be
|> charged on a per-download basis. ...

A good idea.

--
swf@elsegundoca.ncr.com  sarima@netcom.com

The peace of God be with you.

In article <780938605snz@iplbath.demon.co.uk> ipl@iplbath.demon.co.uk writes:
>Here in Britain, BSI seems to take the bizarre POV that standards are not
>to be made available to the public while at Working Draft stage. Could

It appears that the POV is not so bizarre after all, since I have had mail
informaing me that ANSI takes a similar POV. I had assumed that the ANSI
WD/WP (whatever it is called) *was* available, due to the number of people
who seem to have access to a copy. However, perhaps that is wrong.

Is it a 'standard' (:-) procedure to not allow public access until the
standard reaches 'public comment' stage?
If so, is it an ISO procedure, or just up to the discretion of each
national body?
And what stage is 'public comment' anyway? Surely the public have to get
a chance to comment *before* the standard is 'feature-fixed' (at CD
registration/submission)?

I'm afraid I get very confused about the terms used to describe the status
of the 'standard'. Could someone post a summary of ISO terms, as well as
ANSI terms if they are different?
This is something that should go in the FAQ (current status and terminology).

Note that this is not about *electronic* access, this is *any* access.

Is there anyone eles with input on this? Any comments from other countries?

Thanks

Misha Dorman

not speaaking for:

In article <781178351snz@iplbath.demon.co.uk> ipl@iplbath.demon.co.uk writes:
>In article <780938605snz@iplbath.demon.co.uk> ipl@iplbath.demon.co.uk writes:
>>Here in Britain, BSI seems to take the bizarre POV that standards are not
>>to be made available to the public while at Working Draft stage. Could
>
>It appears that the POV is not so bizarre after all, since I have had mail
>informaing me that ANSI takes a similar POV. I had assumed that the ANSI
>WD/WP (whatever it is called) *was* available, due to the number of people
>who seem to have access to a copy. However, perhaps that is wrong.

Hmm, I was under the impression that all documents of ANSI technical
committee work were available for public scrutiny.

>Is it a 'standard' (:-) procedure to not allow public access until the
>standard reaches 'public comment' stage?
>If so, is it an ISO procedure, or just up to the discretion of each
>national body?
>And what stage is 'public comment' anyway? Surely the public have to get
>a chance to comment *before* the standard is 'feature-fixed' (at CD
>registration/submission)?

I'm not sure there *is* a public comment stage in the ISO process.
I think comments are only solicited from member bodies.  But perhaps these
member bodies can use a public comment mechanism to get advice from their
constituencies.

>I'm afraid I get very confused about the terms used to describe the status
>of the 'standard'. Could someone post a summary of ISO terms, as well as
>ANSI terms if they are different?
>This is something that should go in the FAQ (current status and terminology).

There already is a Standards FAQ, posted to comp.std.misc and archived in
all the usual places.  Here's the section that describes the ISO
development process:

    THE ISO PROCESS:

    The Directives give a set of procedures for managing the work of a
    committee which define five stages of document approval:

       The Proposal Stage
            Voting members ballot on the creation of a new
            standards project.

       The Preparatory Stage
            Project Leader manages the development of a Working
            Draft.

       The Committee Stage
            Consensus is achieved on a Committee Draft.

       The Approval Stage
            National bodies vote on a Draft International
            Standard.

       The Publication Stage
            ISO publishes the International Standard.

(The FAQ follows this with detailed descriptions of each stage.)  There's a
comment period during the Committee Stage, but it's not a public comment --
the CD is sent out "to all participating and observing countries of SC-4
and also to Class A Liaison organizations."

ANSI, however, *does* have a public comment requirement.  I think the
closest correspondences to the ISO document names are probably:

 dpANS (draft proposed American National Standard) = CD
 pANS (proposed ANS) = DIS
 ANS = IS

ANSI requires the dpANS to be sent out for public review, and the technical
committee must answer any negative technical comments (either by making
appropriate changes to the dpANS, or by explaining why they haven't).  It
becomes a pANS when public review results in no technical changes being
made to the dpANS.
--

Barry Margolin
BBN Internet Services Corp.
barmar@near.net

>>>>> "B" == Barry Margolin <barmar@nic.near.net> writes:

B> I'm not sure there *is* a public comment stage in the ISO process.
B> I think comments are only solicited from member bodies.  But
B> perhaps these member bodies can use a public comment mechanism to
B> get advice from their constituencies.

I think that is true.  In Sweden we take a very open position.  On
October 17-18 we will give a series of public seminars on C++, STL,
and the standard.  The main motivation is to make people interested in
joining the public review process.

The lectures are split in two parts.  On day one the emphasis is on
tutorials, with lectures by Barbara Moo (AT&T), Andrew Koenig (AT&T,
project editor) and Mike Vilot (ObjectCraft, library WG chair).
On day two the emphasis is on the standard, with lectures on core
language (AK), library (MV) and extensions working group (Dag Bruck,
Dynasim).  There will be plenty of time for discussions.

With this programme we hope to attract a wide audience, even if
"standardization" may sound a little dry (it isn't, really).

My recommendation is that you try to organize similar events, and now
is the right time to do it.  Reviewing the standard is hard work, and
we must give people and companies some time to schedule it; you cannot
expect people to jump on the review with no notice and no knowledge.

Dag Bruck
Swedish head of delegation SC22/WG21

ipl@iplbath.demon.co.uk (Information Processing Ltd) writes

 > In article <780938605snz@iplbath.demon.co.uk> ipl@iplbath.demon.co.uk writes:
 > >Here in Britain, BSI seems to take the bizarre POV that standards are not
 > >to be made available to the public while at Working Draft stage. Could

 > It appears that the POV is not so bizarre after all, since I have had mail
 > informaing me that ANSI takes a similar POV. I had assumed that the ANSI
 > WD/WP (whatever it is called) *was* available, due to the number of people
 > who seem to have access to a copy. However, perhaps that is wrong.

Again, there is a distinction between official procedure and actual practice.

Every four month a copy of the working paper, colloqually known as the WP,
goes to all members of the relevant comittees and every four months members
meet in person. This makes copies of the working paper and the deliberations
of the committee accessible to many - since most members are more than willing
to share their copies with friends and collegues in the - usually vain - hope
of getting some constructive feedback.

However, there is no effort to sell lots of copies of the working paper or
to publish it in a conventional way. Given that three copies of the WP appear
every year a paper copy would be expensive, and most distribution systems (such
as the national standards bureacraties) are not up to getting copies of a WP in
the hands of people until it has been superceded by the next version.

People would not be pleased to discover that about a copy that they had just
spent good money on, or have the comments they have produced with great effort
dismissed as with a polite statement to the effect that ``your comments are
no longer relevant; we already fixed those problems in the latest version.''

Short of electronic publishing - which the standards organizations appears to
be dead set against at least until they find a way of financing themselves that
doesn't depend crucially on selling paper copies of standards - I see no good
supstitute for the current system of many revisions of the WP distributed to
members and informally shared followed by an official draft.

The way I see it is that the official draft is a statement by the committee
that THIS version is stable enough for people to spend time and effort on
and that the committee is willing to spend time and effort considering comments
on it.

Tracking the working paper is a major commitment, and anyone willing to put in
sufficient effort to be able to make constructive contributions is - for good
and bad - assumed to be willing and able to be a member.

There are two practical problems that would need to be addressed by any system
intented to remedy the obvious weaknesses of the current system:

 (1) The offical standards bodies (national and international)
  need funding.

  Governments seem less and less inclined to pay for standards
  through taxes. The traditional method of raising funds have
  been to extract fees from users of standards (i.e. to sell
  expensive standards diocuments). A modern method (perversion?)
  seems to be to extract fees from the people who do the work
  on the standards (the volunteer committee members).

 (2) People who wants to help needs help to ensure that their
  contributions are constructive and their efforts doesn't
  subtract from the amount of effort actually expended on
  the standard.

  The average clever programmer immediately perceives a dozen
  things wrong with the language and the standards process
  and proceeds to produce half a dozen ``obvious remedies.''

  Most of these ``problems'' are based on misconceptions of
  what the language is, how standards are made, what the aims
  of the people involved with the standard are, the state of
  the standards process, etc. A this stage, we see very few
  new problems and even fewer new remedies.

  My impression is that most people need several months to
  read the WP, key documents relating to the aspects of the
  language and the library that they want to contribute to,
  see how the committee members operate in writing, by email,
  and in person. Without such an ``apprentice period'' all
  a newcomer achieves is to divert old-timers from standards
  work into teaching the newcomer ``the ropes.''

  "It really can't be that bad!" must be the reaction many
  will have to that description. However, it is. Think of
  the standard as a multi-year 100+ programmer project.
  A part time project with a significant personel turnover,
  to make matters worse. Do you really want a novice to the
  project write critical code for such a project without an
  acclimatization period?

 I think the ideal standard process would be cheap to take part in
 in in terms of money, but relatively expensive in terms of time
 and effort required.

 > Is it a 'standard' (:-) procedure to not allow public access until the
 > standard reaches 'public comment' stage?
 > If so, is it an ISO procedure, or just up to the discretion of each
 > national body?

Authority is split so nobody dares to do anything out of fear of stepping
on somebody else's toes. This is an area where you can set off an international
incident.

 > And what stage is 'public comment' anyway? Surely the public have to get
 > a chance to comment *before* the standard is 'feature-fixed' (at CD
 > Kregistration/submission)?

Go through the members. Despite malicious misinformation occationally posted
to the contrary, members do listen, most ideas aired in an open forum do
reach the committee, and many such ``informal'' comments have an effect on
its deliberations. If someone writes a note on a specific topic, a member
can put it into a distribution sent to all members.

Many members also try their best to keep you informed about the work of the
committee. For example, most C++ conferences have talks on the results of
the standards work, many journals - notably ``The C++ Report'' carry regular
updates and detailed papers, and my ``Design and Evolution of C++'' book
explains the way the standard is created and summarizes the language features
and the reasons behind the decisions.

The committee can use all the help it can get. If you think you can make a
contribution, try working with a member so that you have access to the latest
information and so that there is a direct path for your ideas into the committee
deliberations. If you work for a large corporation, your employer probably have
a representative on the committee. Various C++ users' groups try to keep their
members posted and often have contacts on the committee. Many countries have
official representation on the ISO committee and ``local'' groups to provide
technical backup for their national representatives.

Look around, whatever the official policy might be, there are ample informal
paths to follow for someone with a bit of initiative.

 - Bjarne Stroustrup

 > I'm afraid I get very confused about the terms used to describe the status
 > of the 'standard'. Could someone post a summary of ISO terms, as well as
 > ANSI terms if they are different?
 > This is something that should go in the FAQ (current status and terminology).
 >
 > Note that this is not about *electronic* access, this is *any* access.
 >
 > Is there anyone eles with input on this? Any comments from other countries?
 >
 > Thanks

In article <Cx5Fvr.GuH@alice.att.com> bs@alice.att.com (Bjarne Stroustrup <9758-26353> 0112760) writes:

   Tracking the working paper is a major commitment, and anyone
   willing to put in sufficient effort to be able to make constructive
   contributions is - for good and bad - assumed to be willing and
   able to be a member.

Except for students. I've asked a couple of times if there was a way
for students to get copies of the WP without paying the full $600
membership which is a bit out of reach for most of us.

--
    Maurizio Vitale
 _______________
|        _      |\   e-mail: mav@cc.gatech.edu     | How many times can
|  /|/| '_) | ) | |  voice:  (404) 881-6083 (home) | a man turn his head,
| | | |_(_|_|/  | |          (404) 853-9382 (work) | and pretend that he
|_______________| |                                | just doesn't see ?
 \_______________\|  fax:    (404) 853-9378        |  - Bob Dylan

In article <MAV.94Oct4101945@gaia.cc.gatech.edu>, mav@gaia.cc.gatech.edu (Maurizio Vitale) writes:
   <deleted>
|> Except for students. I've asked a couple of times if there was a way
|> for students to get copies of the WP without paying the full $600
|> membership which is a bit out of reach for most of us.
|>
|>     Maurizio Vitale

Check the C++ FAQ (I don't have it handy).  There is an address and phone number
to get the latest working papers.  A new version is coming out sometime in
October.  A couple of weeks back I got the January 94 version for about $55,
not $600.  This is not a membership, but a reasonable way to get the document.

--
Gary Lauther   laut4787@mstr.hgc.edu

mav@gaia.cc.gatech.edu (Maurizio Vitale) writes:

 > In article <Cx5Fvr.GuH@alice.att.com> bs@alice.att.com (Bjarne Stroustrup <9758-26353> 0112760) writes:
 >
 >    Tracking the working paper is a major commitment, and anyone
 >    willing to put in sufficient effort to be able to make constructive
 >    contributions is - for good and bad - assumed to be willing and
 >    able to be a member.
 >
 > Except for students. I've asked a couple of times if there was a way
 > for students to get copies of the WP without paying the full $600
 > membership which is a bit out of reach for most of us.

Note that I was describing fact (ANSI/ISO procedures) rather than my preferences
for an ideal situation. The `for good and bad' was put there to alert people
to that.

 - Bjarne

In <Cx5Fvr.GuH@alice.att.com> bs@alice.att.com (Bjarne Stroustrup <9758-26353> 0112760) writes:

<Snip>
>However, there is no effort to sell lots of copies of the working paper or
>to publish it in a conventional way. Given that three copies of the WP appear
>every year a paper copy would be expensive, and most distribution systems (such
>as the national standards bureacraties) are not up to getting copies of a WP in
>the hands of people until it has been superceded by the next version.
>
>People would not be pleased to discover that about a copy that they had just
>spent good money on, or have the comments they have produced with great effort
>dismissed as with a polite statement to the effect that ``your comments are
>no longer relevant; we already fixed those problems in the latest version.''
>
>Short of electronic publishing - which the standards organizations appears to
>be dead set against at least until they find a way of financing themselves that
>doesn't depend crucially on selling paper copies of standards - I see no good
>supstitute for the current system of many revisions of the WP distributed to
>members and informally shared followed by an official draft.

Sound like this topic has been well hashed outside of this forum, so I
hope that I am not sounding a boring or redundant note, but: it seems
to me that electronic publishing need not be free, and could in fact
help to finance the commitee...

<Snip>

>There are two practical problems that would need to be addressed by any system
>intented to remedy the obvious weaknesses of the current system:
>
> (1) The offical standards bodies (national and international)
>  need funding.
>
>  Governments seem less and less inclined to pay for standards
>  through taxes. The traditional method of raising funds have
>  been to extract fees from users of standards (i.e. to sell
>  expensive standards diocuments). A modern method (perversion?)
>  seems to be to extract fees from the people who do the work
>  on the standards (the volunteer committee members).
>
> (2) People who wants to help needs help to ensure that their
>  contributions are constructive and their efforts doesn't
>  subtract from the amount of effort actually expended on
>  the standard.
>
>  The average clever programmer immediately perceives a dozen
>  things wrong with the language and the standards process
>  and proceeds to produce half a dozen ``obvious remedies.''
>
>  Most of these ``problems'' are based on misconceptions of
>  what the language is, how standards are made, what the aims
>  of the people involved with the standard are, the state of
>  the standards process, etc. A this stage, we see very few
>  new problems and even fewer new remedies.
>
>  My impression is that most people need several months to
>  read the WP, key documents relating to the aspects of the
>  language and the library that they want to contribute to,
>  see how the committee members operate in writing, by email,
>  and in person. Without such an ``apprentice period'' all
>  a newcomer achieves is to divert old-timers from standards
>  work into teaching the newcomer ``the ropes.''
>
>  "It really can't be that bad!" must be the reaction many
>  will have to that description. However, it is. Think of
>  the standard as a multi-year 100+ programmer project.
>  A part time project with a significant personel turnover,
>  to make matters worse. Do you really want a novice to the
>  project write critical code for such a project without an
>  acclimatization period?
>
> I think the ideal standard process would be cheap to take part in
> in in terms of money, but relatively expensive in terms of time
> and effort required.

<Snip>
If a dial-up password protected service were established, then the
passwords could be exchanged for credit-card numbers. Users could be
charged on a per-download basis. A (hopefully) large customer base
would allow the prices to be low enough to discourage "pirating" of the
document once it has been obtained. Students could be given discount
rates by selling blocks of passwords to schools. That would allow the
pricing to be tiered in a way that would encourage the academic
community to become (even more) involved in the standards process by
removing the monetary barrier to entry, while allowing those of us who
are more economically empowered to support the standards process in a
more material way. If I understand Dr. Stroustrup correctly the working
papers aren't currently being sold to anyone in any form, so electronic
distribution of them couldn't be any worse economically than the
current system (aside from competition with the drafts which I think
would be negligable). The cost of establishing and maintaining the
dial-up service would be far less than the cost of paper publishing, it
might even be possible to convince an existing forum to donate the time.

Monetary considerations aside, I should think that the discussions on
forums like this would be of far greater interest to commitee members
if the participants were better informed. In addition to raising the
education level of the hit-or-miss general idea pool, a wider
distribution scheme would could make it easier to find the "apprentices"
Dr. Stroustrup mentioned, by exposing college students, especially
grad. students, to the working papers. Students could use the working
papers in their own work thereby gaining familiarity with the workings
of the commitee and then, in turn, use their own work as a basis for
application for (unpaid) internships with the commitee.

One of the strengths of a language (computer or otherwise) is its
breadth of its use. It's a shame that the emerging shape (and process
of evolution) of C++ is so far out of sight for so many of us.

Phil Goodwin                                      PGoodwin@Netcom.com

Hi,

Here in Britain, BSI seems to take the bizarre POV that standards are not
to be made available to the public while at Working Draft stage. Could
someone please mail me the (snail) mail address of ANSI in the US, so
that we can get a copy of the latest WD from them?

Thanks in advance

Misha Dorman

(please reply to mishad@iplbath.demon.co.uk)