This report is in the same form as past "Business Plans." Other items are included in an additional Section 4.
July 2001-July 2002
Coordinate ISO standards for Programming Language Ada
The Technical Corrigendum was published 2001-06-01. WG9 has determined that the best strategy for updating the standard is to develop an Amendment with completion anticipated in 2005. SC22 approved the project subdivision in N3310. The work is currently underway.
WG9 has voted that this standard should be confirmed. SC22 endorsed the request in its 2001 plenary meeting.
WG9 has voted to withdraw this standard. SC22 endorsed the request in its 2001 plenary meeting..
No action is requested.
WG9 has requested that this standard be made freely available on an appropriate web site. The request has been approved by SC22 and JTC1 and awaits concurrence from IEC and implementation.
No action is requested.
Work on the planned amendment to the Ada Language standard has begun.
Preliminary work is underway on one project: A Technical Report providing user guidance on the Ravenscar profile, a programming idiom permitting the use of a low-overhead run-time system in Ada programs. An NP for this effort is anticipated during the coming year.
This standard has been withdrawn.
This standard has been withdrawn.
This standard has been withdrawn..
Withdrawal of this standard was endorsed by the 2000 SC22 Plenary and approved by JTC1. It is expected to be implemented in 2002.
There are two major professional societies in this area: the Special Interest Group on Ada (SIG) of the Association for Computing Machinery and Ada-Europe. The semi-annual meetings of WG9 are scheduled to coincide with the major conferences organized by these two groups. Officials of both organizations are active participants in the work of WG9. Both groups have requested the status of Category C liaison with WG9. Both requests have been "confirmed" by WG9 and have been forwarded to SC22 for approval.
There is one major vendor consortium, the Ada Resource Association (ARA). Informal liaison with ARA is maintained via the Chair of the US TAG.
The United States Department of Defense (DOD) has a continuing interest in the Ada language. Liaison is assured because DoD funds the convener to serve in his position.
Although support for Ada has declined in the US defense sector, Ada remains the language of choice for major parts of the real-time, embedded systems community. Ada usage in other sectors of the marketplace seems to be stable. There is demand for minor improvements while retaining the stability of the existing language. This motivates WG9 to update the language standard by means of an Amendment rather than a Revision.
National body participation in WG9 is growing. There has been long-time participation from Canada, Germany, Japan, UK, and US. Recently, France, Italy and Switzerland have resumed participation. We are advised that Russia will commence participation during the coming year.
Implementation of the planned Category C Liaisons with Ada-Europe and SIGAda will broaden the base of technical review and support for language standardization.
All new work item suggestions are screened by the requirement for active support from five national bodies. This has worked well, resulting in explicit commitments from national bodies supporting a possible project.
WG9 uses three Rapporteur Groups to perform the drafting of its technical documents. This allows WG9 itself to meet only twice per year--for approximately five hours at each meeting. When appropriate, WG9 delegates initial drafting to national bodies. The US contributed the draft of the recently approved Technical Corrigendum. We expect to repeat this strategy with the planned amendment to ISO/IEC 8652.
The following deliverables are anticipated during the next 12 months:
Routine, but efficient, processing will suffice to achieve our goals.
Unexpectedly heavy technical comment could delay any of the items described above. WG9 has mitigated this risk by providing mechanisms for full treatment of NB technical concerns at the WG level.
National body participation in WG9 is growing. The JTC1 approval of the resolution permitting SC22 O-members to participate in working groups has yielded one new member for WG9. Other members will be solicited.
Earlier in this report, I wrote that during the coming year, we anticipate writing an NP for a Technical Report providing user guidance on the Ravenscar profile. It should be noted that I provided the same report last year for this particular item. This lack of progress (in the formal sense) is partially due to SC22. At last year's plenary, WG9 submitted a request that TR 15942 should be made publicly available. As the request fit cleanly into JTC1 policy, it was anticipated that the request would be routinely approved by the plenary meeting and forwarded to JTC1 for approval at their plenary meeting. SC22 did not approve the request, instead scheduling a letter ballot. Although approval was obtained in the letter ballot, it was too late for the JTC1 meeting, hence a letter ballot was scheduled for their approval. Ultimately, this simple request was delayed by six months.
More importantly, the inability of SC22 to adhere to JTC1 policy on public availability triggered a crisis of credibility within WG9. Many participants in WG9 have drawn the conclusion that JTC1 policy on free availability of TRs is not a rule to be followed, but rather a concession to be granted or withheld at the pleasure of SC22. Academic and industrial personnel who had planned contributions to the proposed Technical Report now fear that the document might not be made publicly available due to whim or caprice within SC22. As a result, key contributors are insisting on waiting for outside publication prior to making contributions to the document.
SC22's hesitation in adhering to clear JTC1 policy in this matter has caused substantial harm to the ability of WG9 to progress work rapidly. It would be appropriate for SC22 to repair this damage by taking the following steps: (1) declaring by resolution its support of the JTC1 policy on public availability of Technical Reports; (2) delegating to the SC22 Secretariat the authority to promptly and routinely grant future requests via simple administrative action.
The Amendment described above is the most important item in WG9's current work programme. WG9 anticipates its completion during 2005.
This section lists other items that are not part of the "Business Plan" but are appropriate for the Convener's Report.
SC22 is requested to approve Category C Liaison of Ada-Europe with SC22/WG9 (SC22 N3425) and to forward the request to JTC1 for any further necessary action.
SC22 is requested to approve Category C Liaison of ACM SIGAda with SC22/WG9 (SC22 N3426) and to forward the request to JTC1 for any further necessary action.
SC22 is requested to endorse the application of JTC1 policy on free availability of Technical Reports (contained in JTC1 Sendai Resolution 32) to the Technical Reports of SC22 and to delegate authority to the SC22 Secretariat to administratively grant SC22's endorsement of requests for free availability of SC22 Technical Reports.