what's in a name?

[Michael Priestley <mpriestl@ca.ibm.com>]

Here's my latest attempt at distilling
our purpose into a simple noun phrase.

As background:

the original name:
OASIS Document Standards Interoperability
TC.

issues uncovered over the last few
weeks:
 - what do we mean by document,
standards, interoperability?
- document: an XML document, presumably
with some kind of marked-up content, like an ODF document, a DITA topic,
a DocBook chapter...
- standards: standards for XML document
markup, such as ODF, DITA, DocBook... (to pick three from OASIS that are
represented on the proposing list)
- interoperability: 
        the
ability to reuse content marked up with one standard in contexts marked
up with another standard, for example reusing a DITA topic in a DocBook
chapter; 
        the
ability to do so in a predictable way across multiple standards, using
standardized mechanisms that can be supported by tools such as editors
and publishing engines/servers;
        and
if this means changing some of the standards to be more consistent with
each other, then let's get the requirements on the table!

general problem: 
- each document standard represents
different communities with different terminology
- so it's not surprising that we have
trouble agreeing on what to call the Technical Committee.

proposed solution: 
- make the name somewhat more specific,
but still fairly generic; use the expanded description to define the scope
more closely. 
- otherwise the TC name will be five
paragraphs long :-)


So, without more ado, the new proposed
name:

OASIS Interoperability for XML Document
Markup Standards TC

Rationale for changes:
- expand syntax (putting interop first)
so it's clear that the interoperability applies to the standards, rather
than being a general statement of global interop (we want the standards
themselves to support interoperability)
- expand "document standards"
to "xml document markup standards" to clarify that we mean standards
for marking up xml documents - not standards for transmitting xml documents,
or standards for marking up non-xml documents....

Proposed additional charter information:

- make clear who we are starting with
(DITA, DocBook, ODF) but that we are open to participation from members
of any open standards activity for XML document markup, and for users of
those standards who have cross-standard reuse needs
- make clear what we mean by interoperability,
per the discussion of degrees of interoperability here:
http://www.oasis-open.org/archives/docstandards-interop-discuss/200704/msg00010.html
- provide an illustrative business scenario,
per:
http://www.oasis-open.org/archives/docstandards-interop-discuss/200704/msg00005.html
- provide a list of proposed deliverables,
etc.

Here's the original statement of scope
for background - I suspect it will become quite a bit more verbose with
the above concerns taken into account :-)

One of the benefits that XML touted
from early in its inception was that of platform independence. This independence
greatly helped in its widespread adoption,
yet brought with it the unintended consequence of a proliferation of
standardized XML grammars. Document
standards such as DITA (http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/dita), DocBook
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/docbook),
and ODF (http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/office) all address a
similar need to mark up documentation
in a platform-independent format. 

Increasingly, organizations need to
collaborate and share content with other organizations. As a result, XML
interoperability between these standards
is critical. These standards, however, have not been designed with
cross-standard interoperability in mind.
The Doc Standards Interoperability TC is intended to address the development
and documentation of scenarios for cross-standard
content sharing; a specification for an interoperability framework,
including mappings from participating
standard formats to the framework; and requirements on participating standards
to
improve interoperability. 

Michael Priestley
IBM DITA Architect and Classification Schema PDT Lead
mpriestl@ca.ibm.com
http://dita.xml.org/blog/25