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ISO/IEC JTC 1/WG4 N1936

ISO/IEC JTC 1/WG4

Information Technology ---

Document Description Languages

Introduction

This short report on the Final CD 15445 ISO-HTML is submitted for use at the Alexandria meeting of WG4 to provide background information on the text for NB delegates.

Major points

Working relationship with W3C

Your editors are very pleased to be able to report that they have established a close and effective working relationship with the W3C. There is a clear synergy between the two SDOs. Your editors have made it clear that ISO-HTML will represent a core of the W3C "strict" Recommendation which, based on expert advice from the W3C, they believe to be sufficiently stable and mature to be included in an International Standard. Although the ISO-HTML DTD is not identical to the W3C DTD, the differences are always in the sense of introducing greater rigour into ISO-HTML. For further details of the harmonization of the two specifications, see Document 1931.

Ammendments to ISO/IEC 15445 ISO-HTML

WG4 should be prepared to begin a procedure for updating ISO/IEC 15445 if and when we are advised by the W3C that further facilities, currently excluded by ISO-HTML, have become sufficiently stable and mature to warrant consideration as part of the International Standard.

Your editors strongly recommend that we follow W3C expert advice in these matters.

Timing

The W3C have requested that the announcement dates of the W3C Recommendation for HTML 4.0 and the ISO-HTML be synchronized such that HTML 4.0 appears before ISO-HTML. Your editors support this request which they believe is in the interests of an orderly public presentation of the standards. However they feel that undue delay, for example more than 8 weeks, between the announcements of the HTML 4.0 Recommendation and the DIS 15445 would be detrimental to ISO-HTML, and not in the interests of WG4.

This requires that ISO/IEC 15445 enter its Final CD ballot almost immediately after the Alexandria VA meeting.

Extensions beyond HTML 4.0

Your editors have been instructed by the former SC18/WG8 not to extend the language beyond that defined by the W3C. This policy has been rigorously followed, and is clearly understood by the W3C. As a result, your editors do not believe that it would be opportune to attempt to introduce advanced ideas such as architectural forms into ISO-HTML.

Any desire on the part of WG4 to do this should be expressed as a separate request from WG4 to the W3C. Given the current objectives of the W3C HTML WG, study of such a request could not begin until HTML 4.0 is published when resources might become available.

The published form of ISO-HTML

The source of the ISO-HTML specification is currently a file marked up using Anders Berlund's DTD for use at the ISO Central Secretariat. Interest has been expressed by the Australian NB and others in an ISO-HTML version of the specification. The advantages are:

• A clear demonstration that ISO-HTML meets its requirements, and that it can be rendered by HTML 4.0 conformant browsers.
• An incentive to the fuller use of SGML based standards in the work of standards authorities.
• A more attractive text. For example, page number references to the PostScript rendering of the W3C Recommendation could be replaced by links to the corresponding subclauses in the W3C's primary HTML document. Note that this would also facilitate the maintenance of the ISO text.

At present, your editors plan to submit the Final CD as an SGML source and a LaTeX based PostScript. However they are considering preparing the DIS as an ISO-HTML markup. Such a document would replace the SGML source and would probably mean that ISO/IEC 15445 would be published exclusively on a CD. Note that there is already a precedent for this with the Virtual Reality Modeling Language, (VRML), ISO/IEC DIS 14772.