IT/02-702r

PPC Report to INCITS #21 -- August 2002

Membership

Recent Meetings

• April 22, 2002 -- Teleconference -- PPC #21
• May 22, 2002 -- Teleconference -- PPC #22
• July 16, 2002 -- Teleconference -- PPC #23

Review of TC Procedures

Note that all standing documents referenced in this report can be found at http://www.incits.org/std_docs.html

Status of SD-3 (Project Proposal Guide)

Status of SD-8, Officer's Guide

PPC Recommendation regarding SD-8, Officers Guide:

The issue is described in IT/02-0528r, which describes the potential for subgroup Chairs to ignore requests from the Secretariat, including actions that are needed to protect the accreditation of INCITS.

PPC Recommended (Winkler, Mondello -- Unanimous consent) that INCITS Executive Board discuss the issue and that the Secretariat issue a letter ballot for approval of the recommended revisions to INCITS/SD-2 and INCITS/SD-8.

Status of SD-9 -- INCITS Policy (See announcement of availability)

Policy for authorized uses of subgroup funds is still under review.

Follow-up on ITLB 4461 -- Resolution of comments on SD-9 change to restrict access by non-Members to INCITS financial data

At its May teleconference, PPC considered a request from the Secretariat (IT/02-0527) to develop a policy for confidential documents, based on the fact that information on INCITS finances were available on the Web.

ITLB 4461 was approved by 14-1-0-1. 

o HP votes YES on this letter ballot because we realize the urgent necessity to protect certain TI financial data. However, we are very concerned that the policy seems overly broad, and implies that it is OK to discuss "proprietary information, business intelligence, or otherwise sensitive" documents at any meeting (INCITS or a TC). We don't believe that's what was intended, and it appears contrary to the INCITS Antitrust Guidelines. We would urge PPC to revise this policy, to limit its scope to something like "TI Standards Operations operational data" (which we understand to be the intent) before publishing or further promulgating this policy. 

o (No vote by Panasonic) - The Secretariat should not be empowered to restrict access by members to financial information by withdrawing it from the web site.

The intent was to have the documents available only to INCITS members. The Secretariat noted that members already are required to enter a user ID and password to access the documents, but it was possible for boots to access the web pages without going through the password protection. The Secretariat is exploring measures to preserve the ease of access to the information by members, while protecting from access by those who are not entitled to the information.

Status of SD-10 -- Annual Report Format

Status of SD-2 -- Procedures

PPC Recommendations:

Concurrent public review and management review Reference Secretariat contribution: IT/02-0526

PPC discussed the issue at the May teleconference and recommended (Hill/Winkler, unanimous consent) that the INCITS Executive Board discuss the following changes, in preparation for issuing a Letter Ballot: 

Milestone 5 Management Review

MOVE first three paragraphs in Milestone 5 (below, in red) to Milestone 4, and change the title of Milestone 4 from "Initial Public Review" to "Public Review" [Also, remove all instances of "two-month" public review and leave it duration-unspecified because the length is an ANSI requirement.]

For a draft standard that has reached DIS stage, Milestone 5 consists of the second public review initiated by ANSI upon receipt of the DIS ballot. All comments received before the TC approves the U.S. position shall be considered in developing the U.S. position. Recognizing that the U.S. is obligated to meet international deadlines, comments that are received after the U.S. position has been approved shall be considered prior to the INCITS ballot to adopt nationally the international standard or technical report. The following procedures of Milestone 5 do not apply; see 5.8.

For other projects, the second public review may begin after the INCITS Subgroup approval ballot and the INCITS management review.

After consideration of all comments and resolution of as many comments as possible, the INCITS Subgroup approves the text as suitable for adoption as an American National Standard, ANSI Technical Report, or INCITS Technical Report, as appropriate. The INCITS Subgroup approval vote shall be conducted in accordance with 4.4.

The INCITS Subgroup forwards the proposedfinal text of the draft national standard or technical report to the INCITS Secretariat. The cover to the submittal package is INCITS Form 001, BSR Action Required Transmittal Form. The submittal package includes, but is not limited to:

• the draft standard
• the expository remarks, i.e. the background or history of the project development the final tally of the ballot and any unresolved comments by the INCITS Subgroup developing the draft standard or technical report

• the final tally of the ballot by all INCITS Subgroups with coordinating liaison
• any comments from other INCITS Subgroups reviewing the draft standard or technical report
• the response to any Secretariat concerns that were communicated to the INCITS Subgroup with the results of the compliance review
• all public review comments and the INCITS Subgroup response to each (identifying any unresolved comments)
• the name, address and telephone number of the project editor
• the list of INCITS Subgroup participants

When the INCITS management review indicates processing should continue, the INCITS Secretariat shall initiate several simultaneous activities:

(1) An announcement in ANSI Standards Action of a two-month public review through submittal to ANSI of a BSR-8 package.

(2) A call for information on potentially pertinent patents shall be made to the INCITS Subgroup members and the INCITS Executive Board simultaneously. The call shall also encourage disclosure, where possible, of the existence of pending U.S. patent applications relating to the standard under development, and of any relevant unexpired foreign patents.

(3) Notification to the INCITS Subgroup of the responses received by the INCITS Subgroup, ANSI, and the INCITS Secretariat resulting from previous calls for patents.

(4) Issuance of a press release describing the draft standard or technical report, and announcing availability of the document for a two-month final review and comment period.

The dpANS submitted for public review contains a notice that any comments should to be sent to the INCITS Secretariat with a copy to the BSR. The INCITS Secretariat shall register every public review comment. Each comment shall be sent immediately to the originating INCITS Subgroup for consideration and to INCITS for information. A formal response must be developed for each comment and approved by the INCITS Subgroup in accordance with 4.4.

Responses to registered comments shall include the provision that the commentor has twenty working days from the postmark to reply and indicate if the comment(s) has not been satisfactorily resolved.

The response may be either a modification to the draft national standard, or a statement of the rationale for not making a change. Serious effort should be made to accommodate the comment by correspondence or discussion with the author.

In the case of changes that are editorial only, all comments are resolved, either by changes to the dpANS or by communication with the commentor. The INCITS Subgroup shall advise the INCITS Secretariat and provide all pertinent correspondence. The INCITS Secretariat shall advise the INCITS Executive Board.

In the case of one or more substantive changes to the dpANS in order to resolve the public review comments, the INCITS Subgroup carries out the voting requirements in 4.4. If the INCITS Subgroup achieves the criteria for approval, the INCITS Subgroup shall send the comments, the replies to the comments, ballot results, the revised text, a summary of the changes and rationale to the INCITS Secretariat.

The INCITS Secretariat shall advise the INCITS Executive Board that a further public review is required and shall take action to notify the purchasers of the latest dpANS that another public review is necessary. Subsequent public reviews shall begin no sooner than thirty days after the mailing of responses to public review comments. Processing then returns to the beginning of Milestone 5.

If there are no public review comments during the second (or subsequent) public review, the INCITS Secretariat will forward the document to INCITS for final approval.

The dpANS and draft technical reports, the method of approval is in accordance with 4.4, to submit the dpANS to BSR for approval as an American National Standard. When the draft technical report is also being proposed for approval as an ANSI technical report, it will include approval to forward the TR to ANSI for registration. The draft standard or technical report is forwarded to INCITS Executive Board members. The document references for all public comments and the TC responses to each will also be provided to the members.

Reaffirmation

--If, by the four-year anniversary of the approval or last reaffirmation of a standard or the nine-year anniversary of the approval or last reaffirmation of a technical report, the TC responsible for the standard or technical report has not forwarded a proposed revision to the standard or technical report or a recommendation for reaffirmation or withdrawal of the standard or technical report, INCITS shall take action during the fifth year to approve reaffirmation or withdrawal of the standard and during the tenth year to approve reaffirmation or withdrawal of the technical report.--

--At its May teleconference, PPC recommended (Winkler, Richards, unanimous consent) that the change should be discussed at the next INCITS meeting as part of the PPC report, and the Secretariat should subsequently issue a letter ballot for approval of the change.

Formal establishment of Management Operations Committee  IT/02-0590

Response to INCITS Action Items

oITLB 4452, "Follow-up and Ten-Day Reconsideration of ITLB 4384, Recommendation to change INCITS/SD-2, Section 5.4.3, Terms of Elected Officers" IT/02-0627

PPC agreed with the comments regarding the shortcomings in the approved text, but considered the revised text to be an improvement over the previous situation. The proposed text by Oracle is a further improvement, but still leaves some gaps. This needs to be retained on the issues list. 
 

oITLB 4453, "Follow-up and Ten-Day Reconsideration of ITLB 4385, Recommendation to change INCITS/SD-2, Section 5.4.1.2, PPC (To eliminate the term limit for PPC officers)" IT/02-0628

PPC noted the comments. PPC observed that other things are in play with the addition of text for the MOC and possible major changes resulting from a merger, which may result in having term limits for all management committee officers, including PPC. 
 

oITLB 4454, "Follow-up and Ten-Day Reconsideration of ITLB 4388, Recommendation to change INCITS/SD-2, Section 4.2.3.1.4, TCs, TGs & SGs (Voting Membership)" IT/02-0629

PPC noted the difficulty with startup committees, and agreed that it should be possible to attain voting rights immediately at either the formation meeting or the second meeting of a group. PPC noted that the ballot did not correctly reflect the intended change and recommended (Hogan/Mondello, unanimous consent) that the issue be reballoted with the correct revision:

A representative of a prospective voting member shall initially attend a meeting of the TC, TG, or SG without voting privileges and reaffirm interest in the work of the TC, TG, or SG. Voting privileges become effective with attendance at one of the next two successive meetings and receipt by the Secretariat of the applicable fees for the membership year. For a new subgroup, all attendees at the formation meeting or second meeting shall be considered voting members, subject to the rules in section 4.2.4 below.

Changes & Proposed Changes since December 2000 - Rev. 6g 1

As of July 9, 2002.

No.	Issue	Ref. Documents	Status
0.	Baseline	SD-2 Rev 6g1	NCITS was reaccredited by ANSI ExSC with SD-2 (rev. 6g1) on April 21, 2001.
1.	Change 7-day deadline for submitting project proposals	Dick Steinbrenner contribution	ITLB 4215 closed on 2001-07-18; change was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7b)
2.	2/3 rule for small TCs	Raised at TC Symposium	ITLB 4213 closed on 2001-07-18; change was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7b)
3.	Nomination of international officers	IT/00-0396	ITLB 4216 closed on 2001-07-18; change was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7b)
4.	Excused absence for meetings held outside US	Resulted from complaints by some TC members of time and expense to travel to a TC meeting in Australia.	PPC #16: TCs already had the ability to excuse an absence, but this ability should only be used in special circumstances. TCs might not be aware of this. PPC agreed to close this as an SD-2 issue and move it to the SD-9 issues list.
5.	Transfer of membership when work is moved to a different TC.	IT/01-0256r2 item 4.3	LB 4145 closed on April 14 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7)
6.	Ballot period for reaffiirmation	IT/01-0256r2 item 4.1	LB 4146 closed on April 14, 2001 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7)
7.	Milestone 4, resolution of responses to registered comments	IT/01-256r2 item 4.4	LB 4144 closed on April 14, 2001 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7)
8.	Attendance requirements in two-session mode	IT/01-256r2 item 4.5	Note that only non-US domiciled are limited to attending only the non-TAG session.
9.	Concurrent public review and management review	IT/01-256r2	Should be considered in context of suggestions from MOC
10.	Need for original project proposal with reaffirmation		LB 4214 closed on July 18, 2001 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7b)
11.	Revision of INCITS project types	INCITS action item	Under investigation; John Hill is preparing a recommendation.
12.	Lack of agreement on meeting time and venue for appeal		ITLB 4299 closed on November 23, 2001 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7)
13.	Need for coordinating liaison	INCITS action item to remove all text pertaining to coordinating liaisons.	ITLB 4328 closed on March 1, 2002 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7c). Note that this change also involves revision to SD-3.
14.	Distribution of LBs to P and A representatives.	Resulted from problems in some subgroups	ITLB 4329 closed on March 1, 2002 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7c)
15.	Duration of call for volunteers	90 days can be too long for a new TC.	ITLB 4330 closed on March 1, 2002 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7c)
16.	Attainment of membership	Results of discussion at November NCITS meeting	ITLB 4327 closed on March 1, 2002 with a vote of 15-1-0-0, so a reconsideration ballot was conducted. Reconsideration Ballot ITLB 4353 closed on  March 21, 2002 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7c).
17.	Time lines for international processing	Resulted from case in which US was unable to process a nomination in time	Reviewed by PPC. No shortcuts were identified.
18.	Development of a simplified SD-2	The need is obvious	The first step will be to make it easier to navigate the document.
19.	Misplaced text for reaffirmation	Section 5.2.5 includes text that probably belongs in 5.2.2 since it addresses the situation in which a TC fails to act on a reaffirmation.	PPC recommended a revision to be presented at August 2002 INCITS Executive Board meeting
20.	Officer nominations	Discussed at November NCITS meeting	No further change is required. Cleanup of membership rules fixed the problem.
21.	Change in membership representation of a sitting officer	Discussed at November NCITS meeting	ITLB 4384 closed on May 30, 2002 and was approved, but there are negative ballots to be addressed.
22.	Clarification of objections criteria for fast track	Use of prima facie did not provide well-defined criteria	ITLB 4298 closed on November 15, 2001 and was approved. Text is reflected in SD-2 (rev. 7b)
23.	Removal of term limit for PPC Chair	PPC Meeting #20.	ITLB 4385 closed on May 30, 2002 and was approved, but there are negative ballots to be addressed.
24.	Alignment of TC and EB membership rules	Comments on ITLB 4353 (See issue 20)	ITLB 4388 closed on May 31, 2002. Aligns TC and EB rules (voting privileges begin at second meeting attended), but also liberalizes the current rule for newly formed subgroups.
25.	Stabilized standards	INCITS action 19.22	ITLB 4462 closed on June 10, 2002 and was approved. An editorial change (removal of a comma) is needed.
26.	Negative vote without comments	Alignment with ExSC 6070	ITLB 4386 closed on May 30, 2002 and was approved.