From owner-incits-v1@incits-v1.org Thu Jul 12 10:16:03 2007 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2007 13:13:30 -0400 From: Patrick Durusau Subject: Re: INCITS-V1: Two types of diapprove with comments In-reply-to: Sender: owner-incits-v1@incits-v1.org To: incits-v1@incits-v1.org Reply-to: incits-v1@incits-v1.org X-PMX-Version: 5.2.0.264296 X-ASG-Debug-ID: 1184260445-58a700150000-E618Iy X-Barracuda-URL: http://10.10.100.8:8000/cgi-bin/mark.cgi X-Barracuda-Connect: unknown[66.110.197.207] X-Barracuda-Start-Time: 1184260445 X-ASG-Whitelist: Client X-ASG-Orig-Subj: Re: INCITS-V1: Two types of diapprove with comments X-Barracuda-Virus-Scanned: by Barracuda Spam Firewall at insimail.com Rob, > > My recommendation is to vote "No with comments", but not to check the > "Acceptance of specified technical modifications will change our vote > to approval" option. Why? Because I do not believe the Ecma's or our > review has been sufficient to find anything but a small portion of the > grave errors in this specification. I've done my best to write down > the problems I've found, as have others, and we've all worked hard to > discuss what has been reported. So this is not for lack of effort on > our part. But it is also a fact that we have not been able to conduct > anything close to a thorough review. I can open to almost any page of > this specification and find serious ambiguities, undefined behaviors > and outright errors. I've reported what I could, based on the time > permitted us, but this is just the tip of the iceberg. Merely fixing > the reported errors will still leave an enormous number of problems in > the standard. I'm operating on the cockroach theory of quality here. > If you see a few, there are certainly many. Based on the defects > I've seen and reported so far, I am convinced that this DIS needs to > be returned for comprehensive review and editing within Ecma, after > which it may be resubmitted for JTC1 NB review. > > OOXML, as we received it, was not ready for a DIS ballot, and should > never have been submitted to JTC1 in this state. > I am sure that everyone, including members of TC 45 appreciate the hard work you have done in reviewing DIS 29500. But, on the other hand, comments about the quality of material not reviewed aren't helpful. Moreover, I haven't seen any signal from TC 45 that they are simply going to correct only issues that are pointed out to them. I am fairly sure they have a list of issues they have found internally before the review by NBs and they want to correct those as well. I don't doubt that even after several more months of hard work by TC 45 and aided by NBs from around the world that there are going to be problems remaining in DIS 29500. If you have been watching the discussion list on OpenDocument you will notice that suggestions have been made for corrections there as well. I think I understand your position but I also think that simply asking TC 45 members, one of who is the editor of DIS 29500, if they are going to correct errors and problems with DIS 29500 that aren't the subject of NB comments (which I am sure they are) would be the better approach. I don't mean to discourage anyone from posting any opinions concerning any issue but I do think that some ways of discussing issues are more productive than others. Hope you are having a great day! Patrick -- Patrick Durusau patrick@durusau.net Chair, V1 - US TAG to JTC 1/SC 34 Acting Convener, JTC 1/SC 34/WG 3 (Topic Maps) Co-Editor, ISO/IEC 13250-1, 13250-5 (Topic Maps) Co-Editor, OpenDocument Format (OASIS, ISO/IEC 26300)