Annual Report for: INCITS W1
Covering the Period from January 1, 2002 to December 31, 2002 (Report completed June 27, 2003)
Title of INCITS Subgroup: Office Equipment
Links:
Informal Description of Work:
The InterNational Committee on Information Technology (INCITS) W1 subcommittee develops standards for office equipment -- scanners, printers, facsimile equipment, copiers and multi-function devices and consumables for this equipment. It serves in two capacities: as INCITS W1 (national standards) and as the US Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to the International Standards Organization / International Electrotechnical Commission (ISO/IEC) JTC1, Information Technology, Subcommittee 28 on Office Equipment (international standards). The Committee's activities focus on office equipment test standards (image reproduction), evaluation standards (image quality and longevity, office equipment & consumables quality and performance) and calibration techniques (perception-based metrics and optimization systems).
All current W1 projects are for directly developing international standards in cooperation with ISO/IEC JTC1/SC28.
This year, the membership was eleven, compared to twelve members in 2001. The dropout was International Paper--their management decided that the advantages of participation did not justify the cost and employee time necessary to participate in the current business environment. Most member companies participate regularly and actively. Progress on some projects was excellent, but several projects languished because of very slow response (or no response) by the SC28 secretariat when action was needed or when requests were made to them. (At the date of this report the situation has improved dramatically).
The chairman SC28, Raul Colcher reached the end of his 3 year term in October, and resigned as Chairman. The Brazilian standards organization decided not to continue as sponsor for the SC28 secretariat.
Norm Burningham, the leader of the largest W1 standards project (NP19751--a multi part standard on perception based image quality measurement) had to resign as project editor because of work demands at HP. Fortunately he was able to recruit a very able and conscientious volunteer to take over this critical and demanding position -- Eric Zeise of NexPress.
W 1 has operated for part of the year without a vice-chairman or an International Representative. Mashiho Yuasa resigned W1 membership and the vice-chairman because her company (International Paper) decided not to continue its W1 membership. The former IR, Claude Zeller is willing to continue as IR, but has had some difficulty getting permission from his employer, Pitney Bowes. He expects to be able to obtain permission eventually.
• Participating in the Ballot Resolution Meeting for DIS 19839 in Berlin Feb 26-29, 2002
This was a fast track proposal from Germany—"Information technology – Office machines – Machines for colour image reproduction – Method of specifying image reproduction of colour devices by digital and analog test charts" parts 1-4. The US and Japan strongly opposed this standard because we thought that it contained numerous fundamental technical flaws. After a thorough discussion of the issues and a compromise proposal by Germany, Terry Nelson of HP (a US delegate) presented an explanation of a number of the fundamental flaws of the standard. Japan Concurred. After it was clear that the remedies sufficient to satisfy the US and Japan would involve a complete rewrite of the standard, (which could not be done in the time available at the BRM), a recount of the votes was made. The new vote confirmed the original DIS international ballot—fail by both voting criteria.
The U.S. and Japan had pointed out these flaws after the introduction of the fast track standard (May 2000). Even though Germany subsequently made some improvements, no one in the U.S. or Japan was willing to do the major rewrite to solve the problems, and Germany did not think that it was necessary because they thought that the standard was good without changes.
The U.S. then proposed that the BRM recommend that the work be published as a Technical Report Type 3 (not convertible to a standard), and the BRM delegates voted to approve this recommendation.
• Attending the 13th ISO/IEC JTC1/SC28 Plenary
Brazil hosted the Plenary meeting held at Teresopolis May 6-10. U.S. Delegates were Paul Jeran (HOD) and Norman Burningham both of Hewlett-Packard, and Paul Spencer of Spencer Services and Design. Technically the meeting was successful with presentation of significant progress for many of the current projects. The U.S. representatives made a significant effort to continue to build cordial relations with Germany after the conflicts which resulted from the German fast track DIS19839. Brazil announced that they would relinquish the Secretariat and Chairmanship of SC28 effective in October, 2002.
• The project to develop a standard for quality and performance of office equipment that may contain re-used components (NP24700) is already in a relatively mature state due to diligent efforts by Xerox. At the plenary it was resolved to register the current draft j28N551 as a CD.
• SC28 project NP 19751, Image Quality Standards for Printer Systems, which is an important project with very wide scope has continued to achieve significant progress. Eric Zeise took over as project editor after the original project editor, Norman Burningham had to resign. At the Non Impact Printing (NIP) conference of IS&T in October, there was a session devoted to a review of progress on this project, which more than 900 people attended!
• An ad hoc working group was activated to start work on a method for measurement of printer output resolution. This is a part of the perception based image quality measurement standard (NP19751)
• The SC28 plenary approved NP19752, Measurement of Monochrome Cartridge Yield for submission as an FCD for FDIS balloting after another round of comments and revisions was completed.
• Initial work has started on the project for color toner cartridge yield, SC28 project NP 19798. Progress is slow because of the demands of continuing work on the monochrome toner cartridge yield project (NP19752). It is intended to make the color yield standard as compatible as possible with the monochrome standard.
• Defeating the possible resurrection of DIS 19839 at Ballot Resolution Meeting in Berlin
This standard was a qualitative and coarsely quantitative way to evaluate printers and other office equipment using a standard test pattern file taken from an earlier standard for evaluation of copiers (ISO 15775). The U.S. and Japan felt that DIS 19839 was weak technically, and was potentially dangerous because it might be used for office equipment performance measurement for control or restriction of office equipment sales in Europe. Because the measurements would not be technically sound, this would provide a very arbitrary and difficult environment for fair comparisons of office equipment.
Hewlett-Packard assigned a very able engineer, Terry Nelson to work for about 3 months to study the standard, to make measurements, and to develop a U.S. technical position on the DIS. As a result of this work, he was able to demonstrate the technical flaws which were necessary to argue the U.S. position. Because of the complexity and length of the standard, this was a very difficult task
Both the U.S. and Japan worked very hard to present the U.S. and Japanese position to the countries which had participated in the international ballot, and to obtain proxies from countries not able to attend the BRM. We were able to obtain the votes to sustain the disapproval vote of the original international ballot.
• Lack of SC28 responsiveness
W1 progress on several standards projects was significantly hampered because the SC28 secretariat did not carry our requested actions or was very slow in doing them. Even with as many as 4 or 5 repeated requests or pleas for some requests there was little or no response. Examples are: not obtaining project numbers for approved NPs, and not officially invoking the Vienna Agreement with CEN on the project on print quality attributes for Machine-readable digital postal marks (NP 18050).
Andre Valle had asked to resign at the time of the Plenary in May, but agreed to stay until the chairman (Raul Colcher) finished his 3 year term in October. Mr. Valle was apparently able to spend very little time on SC28 matters after the Plenary (between May and October). (Since the approval of Japan as the new Secretariat and Chairman, and an initial period of "learning the ropes" there has again been good response from the SC28 secretariat.)
• Considering a U.S. offer to provide the Secretariat and Chairman for SC28
W1 discussed the possibility of finding volunteers to offer to act as Secretariat and Chairman of SC28 once we learned that they would become vacant. Germany had volunteered, but both the US and Japan office equipment committees agreed that accepting their offer would significantly hamper our standards development efforts and make it much more difficult to improve the somewhat impractical standards which Germany has presented in recent years. The members of our committee explored the possibilities but were not able to find either funds or volunteers. We feel that it is very fortunate that Japan was able to volunteer and be accepted by JTC1.
• Vacant W1 officer positions
During 2002, both the International Representative (IR) and Vice President positions have been vacant for much of the year. It is probable that Claude Zeller of Pitney Bowes will be able to resume the IR position. The chairman has actively recruited and pleaded for a volunteer for VP, with no success so far. All of the Principals and Alternates on W1 are very able and in high demand at their own companies, and in many cases their standards work is almost an overtime job. With these conditions, it is easy to see why theW1 participants are hesitant to volunteer.
• NP 18050 Vienna agreement problems
Because of missing action by the SC28 secretariat, the Vienna agreement was never officially invoked with CEN (European standards organization) which is carrying out the development of the standard on print quality attributes for machine-readable digital postal marks (NP 18050). The standard is at the CEN "Pink Paper" stage (equivalent to a CD?). We need to complete the paperwork so that CEN will know we have a mirror Standard in SC28, and so that SC28 member feedback can be incorporated in the next CEN draft.
• Fast Track problems
We expect that there will be continuing controversy with Germany regarding German standards introduced as fast track standards. The German orientation tends toward that of a government bureau thinking up good rules. In contrast, the W1 members have a practical manufacturer and consumer orientation.
W1 has continued to discuss possible rule changes to make it easier to avoid difficulties with poor, impractical, or untested fast track introductions. In addition to the two possibilities mentioned in last year's annual report:
Require that the proposer of a fast track standard must demonstrate actual (not artificial) use of the standard by at least several users and to document this with feedback from the users.
Change the international ballot format to allow and require that there be a careful discussion of the advantages, limitations and potential (or actual) problems of the proposed fast track standard. The format should allow for dissent, or non-concurring opinions so that the NB voters receive a balanced view of differing opinions on the merit and problems with the standard. This would make it easier for them to make an informed vote.
W1 has thought of another possibility:
Require that the proposer of a fast track standard submit the standard to SC members for international review and comment. If more than say 25% or 33% of the members respond that the standard would require significant changes for that country to agree to vote for the standard, then the standard would have to go through the normal (non-fast track) standards development and approval procedure. (Assuming that the standard was reasonably good, it should go through the normal process faster than most standards, since most of the initial work would have been already completed.
We know that standards development rule changes are difficult to make. However, in the last 3 years it has been necessary for W1 members to expend a large amount of effort and money to do the research necessary to defend U.S. opposition to two fast track standards almost untested in consumer use at the national level. This included travel and lodging for two delegates to attend two different BRMs and at least 3 man months of work for a high grade engineer in addition to normal evaluation, writing, discussions and email communication by many others. We are think that this flaw in the standards development process could be fixed without materially changing or impeding the fast track process. We also feel that if the fast track introducer is conscientious in introducing only standards which are well tested and proven, such rule changes would not be necessary.
• Anticipation of leadership transition
The term of the current chairman ends at the end of summer, 2004. Because his sponsoring company is a one man part-time consulting business, with total revenues of only $5000-7000 per year, his travel expenses to the annual face-to face W1 meeting in April, and to the SC28 plenary and to meetings such as the BRM are essentially paid out of personal retirement funds. For these reasons, he will not be able to continue as chairman after the end of his three year term unless adequate external funding is obtained. Previous attempts were unsuccessful, so obtaining such funding is probably unlikely.
During 2003, the chairman hopes to nurture the development of the proper psychological climate within the committee to prepare for and to aid the transition to a new chairman, and to help find a volunteer for the position before it becomes vacant.
The link to the W1 archive of meetings and minutes is:
http://www.incits.org/tc_home/w1htm/meetings.htm
|
Meeting Number |
Date |
Location |
|
1 90 minutes |
Jan. 24 |
Phone Conference |
|
Ballot Resolution Mtg. DIS19832 |
Feb. 26-28 |
Berlin Germany (2 delegates) |
|
2 |
April 23-24 |
Wash. D.C. |
|
SC28 Plenary |
May 6-10 |
Teresopolis, Brazil (3 delegates) |
|
3 90 minutes |
June 12 |
Phone Conference |
|
4 90 minutes |
August 28 |
Phone Conference |
|
5 90 minutes |
Sept. 25 |
Phone Conference |
|
6 90 minutes |
Oct. 30 |
Phone Conference |
|
7 90 minutes |
December 4 |
Phone Conference |
|
Meeting Number |
Date |
Location |
|
1 |
Jan. 29 |
Phone Conference |
|
2 |
March 5 |
Phone Conference |
|
3 |
April 10-11 |
Wash. D.C. |
|
4 |
May 28 |
Phone Conference |
|
SC28 Plenary |
May |
Cheju, Korea |
|
5 |
July 9 |
Phone Conference |
Measurement Of Cartridge Yield -- NP19752, SC28 N351; SC28 N430, SC28 N444 - Paul Jeran of Hewlett Packard, W1 principal member, established a liaison with the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM).
Print Quality Attributes for Machine Readable Digital Postage Marks -- NP18050, SC28 N440 – Claude Zeller of Pitney Bowes, W1 member, is continuing the liaison with CEN TC 331 and ISO/IEC JTC1 SC31 regarding postal mark standards.
Digital Cameras – Robert Cookingham of Kodak, W1 member has been appointed to establish a liaison with ISO TC42/WG-18.
Standards for the Graphic Arts – Yee Ng of NexPress Solutions, W1 member, and Nobuaki Usui of Japan will establish and carry out a liaison with ISO TC130.
Quality and Performance of Office Equipment that may contain re-used components – NP24700, SC28 N443 --Anne Stocum of Xerox, a participant in the work of W1 and project editor of SC28’s NP 24700, has started the process of establishing liaison with and working with IEC TC56 which has an NP with similar aims and methods
|
Position (and training date) |
Name and organization represented |
Tenure |
|
|
|
|
|
Chair October 9, 2002 |
Paul R. Spencer, Spencer Services and design |
Principal, HP 1995-99. Principal, Sp. Services & Design 1999-2002. Chairman, 2001- |
|
Vice Chair |
Vacant since Feb. 2002 |
|
|
Secretary |
|
|
|
International Representative (?) |
Dr. Claude Zeller (expected to reassume this position |
Principal, Pitney Bowes, 1998-2002. IR 1999-2002 |
|
Vocabulary Representative |
|
|
Attached at the end of this document is the membership list.
W1 deals with office Equipment and the functions of offices are primarily to handle information. "Handling" included transcribing, storing, printing, distributing etc., and the information is in either verbal or document (both text and images) form.
I perceive several technology trends in this area:
Digital Information storage is rapidly becoming cheaper and more flexible. This storage can be done both on-line and by CDs or DVDs. There are many advantages compared to paper documents, including the capability of computer searches and auto-indexing.
There has been a long-standing prediction that less hard copy document storage (filing cabinet) will be needed and therefore less office printing will be done. If this occurs it might have a significant negative effect on the companies which support W1. So far the prediction has proved false, and I expect that situation to continue for at least several more years. Somehow the human interface with the higher resolution printed hardcopy is superior to that with a computer display, especially when multiple documents are being used simultaneously.
Digital Information transmission bandwidth is rapidly increasing and transmission costs are strongly decreasing. This trend should encourage use of larger documents with more images and thus result in increased printer and copier usage. Postal mail and Fax document transmission should decrease relative to electronic transmission of documents over the internet. Similarly, the use of printed forms will decrease relative to the use of electronic forms especially when encrypted document and digital signature techniques become commonly understood and used
The brutal decrease in the cost/performance ratio of office equipment will continue. This will make it difficult for the office equipment manufacturers, but will result a real benefit to customers and therefore in a continued expansion of the office equipment market (at least in terms of wider use). If manufacturers can also decrease the operating cost (cost per page) for printers and copiers, expanded volume of usage in current markets can also be achieved.
The crunch of profits due to the strong market competition and the continuing economic stagnation may make it more difficult for the manufacturers of office equipment to be generous enough to support standards activities until the economic downturn ends. W1 has followed through in its plan to document and publicize the financial benefit for companies to participate in the office equipment standards development process by presenting papers and status reports at the IS&T NIP and PICS conferences. There has been no immediate effect on W1 committee membership but many more people and companies are aware of our efforts, and there have been some new volunteers to help with the research necessary for some of the current W1 projects.
To compete in the marketplace the manufacturers will continue to significantly improve office equipment quality and capability. This will require new or improved standards for measurement of printer and scanner performance. W1 is participating in several projects in anticipation of these needs.
There is increasing use of color in documents and images in the office. This will require new standards for measuring color print and image quality both for high precision and high accuracy quality comparisons, and rough but fast and simple "consumer" grade measurements. W1 has several current projects in these areas.
The techniques necessary for these standards are usually well understood and are often available inside specific companies as proprietary methods. Thus in developing the necessary standards it is often not necessary to do a large amount of new research. Instead it is only necessary to get the experts to cooperate and agree to all disclose the private methods for public comparison and testing. This situation is the case for the image quality measurement project NP19751.
There will be a continued rapid improvement of computer power and improved functionality at a decreased cost for all electronics equipment and circuits. This trend can result in drastic changes in office equipment capability and use. An example is speech recognition by computer. In the last 2 years inexpensive software ($50) for ordinary office computers is available which is capable of very good speech recognition of natural speech. This will significantly improve the overall efficiency of converting people’s thoughts to text documents, since many people do not type rapidly. This capability will also be used with mobile computers and will eventually make good voice controlled computing a common mode of operation. I think this will be especially useful with mobile computers to enable operation and control with little use of hands.
I think this improved functionality will increase the use of office equipment because of the increase in the flow of information and by greater market penetration with the improved products.
Future Projects -- W1 expects that it will be necessary to develop a standard for ink jet printer cartridge yield for both color and monochrome printing. Currently there are no inkjet printing people participating on our standards projects. Our plan is to finish the EP monochrome cartridge yield standard and then roll the project over to EP color (which is already approved as an SC28 NP) and then eventually to an inkjet printing cartridge yield measurement standard project.
One of the agenda items for our April meeting each year is to discuss other potential new standards projects. Any ideas selected as worthwhile are assigned to one of the W1 members who prepares an NP proposal in time for the SC28 plenary in May. Two of the possible areas for a standard which have been discussed are for Multi Function Devices (scanner-copier-printer-FAX combinations) and for variable data printing. So far no W1 participant has conceived an idea for a standard in these areas which is needed and would be useful.
Since the personal computer is actually the central and most important piece of office equipment, W1 has several times discussed whether there are any projects suitable for W1 effort. So far none have been recognized—everything seems to be well covered by other committees.
Mentioned above was the need for improved measurement method standards because of the increase in office equipment quality. I think that there is also a need for fast, simple, easy to understand and easy-to-use measurement methods suitable for rough and basic comparisons and characterization of office equipment. These should be suitable for ordinary users of the equipment and not require special equipment.
The financial situation of W1 was explained in last year's annual report. The only funds are some left over from the plenary donations last year, and are the property of the companies donating them. The only change since last year is that some of the W1 member companies used all or part of this left-over donation money to pay for all or part of their 2002 annual W1 committee fee.
Membership list 6/19/203
Cookingham, Robert…………….Principal……Voting…… Phone: 716-722-4003 Fax: 716-588-1999
Email: robert.cookingham@kodak.com
1700 Dewey Ave. MAG 01860 1/67/RL
EASTMAN KODAK CO
Rochester, NY 14650 USA
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JERAN, PAUL……….. Principal…..Voting………. Phone: 208-396-6144 Fax: --
Email: paul_jeran@hp.com
11311 CHINDEN BOULEVARD Hewlett-Packard Co
BOISE, ID 83707 USA
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Freeman, Mark…………Principal……Voting…………. Phone: 303-924-7034 Fax: 303-924-4662
Email: mfreeman@us.ibm.com
6300 Diaganol Highway Mail Stop 003L
IBM Corporation
Boulder, CO 80301 USA
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MENARD, PAUL………Principal……Voting………. Phone: 859-232-7379 Fax: --
Email: menard@lexmark.com
740 NEW CIRCLE ROAD LEXMARK INTERNATIONAL
LEXINGTON, KY 40511 USA
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OTA, KEN ………….Alternate……………. Phone: 408-570-9655 Fax: 408-570-9690
Email: kenken@minolta-mil.com
2940 NORTH FIRST STREET
MINOLTA LABORATORY INC
SAN JOSE, CA 95134 USA
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TOMITA, HIROSHI…….Principal……Voting……… Phone: 408-383-0477 Fax: 408-383-0322
Email: tomita@minolta-mil.com
2940 NORTH FIRST STREET MINOLTA LABORATORY INC
SAN JOSE, CA 95134 USA
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NG, YEE………..Principal…..Voting……… Phone: 716-726-3935 Fax: 716-726-7670
Email: Ye_Ng@nexpress.net
901 ELMGROVE ROAD NEXPRESS SOLUTIONS LLC
ROCHESTER, NY 14653 USA
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ZEISE, ERIC………..Alternate……….. Phone: 716-726-4333 Fax: 716-253-1865
Email: Eric_Zeise@nexpress.net
1447 ST PAUL STREET NEXPRESS SOLUTIONS LLC
ROCHESTER, NY 14653 USA
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Spencer, Paul ………Principal……Voting………….. Phone: 509-332-6699 Fax: --
Email: paul-spencer@qnet.com
1745 SW Baldwin Drive
Spencer Services and Design
Pullman, WA 99163-5525 USA
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ZELLER, CLAUDE……….Principal ……Voting…….. Phone: 203-924-3524 Fax: 203-452-0836
Email: zellerpb@earthlink.net
35 WATERVIEW DRIVE M/S 2621
PITNEY BOWES INC
SHELTON, CT 06484-8000 USA
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UEMOTO, KAREN…….Alternate……… Phone: 703-351-7048 Fax: 703-532-0293
Email: Kuemoto@aol.com
5063 NORTH 37TH STREET PITNEY BOWES INC
ARLINGTON, VA 22207 USA
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Briggs, John ………………Principal………..Voting………. Phone: 781-221-0080….Fax: 781-221-7107
Email: jcb@qea.com
99 South Bedford St. #4
QUALITY ENGINEERING ASSOCIATES
Burlington, MA 01803 USA
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Fiasconaro, Catherine………..Alternate……… Phone: 631-367-6655 Fax: --
Email: fiasconaro@spencer.com
Three Gifford Way Spencer Labs
Melville, NY 11747-2310 USA
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WYHOF, JOHN………Liaison……… Phone: 919-774-3808 Fax: 919-776-8943
Email: johnw@SCC-INC.com
3010 LEE AVENUE
STATIC CONTROL COMPONENTS INC
SANFORD, NC 27330 USA
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O'Reilly, Kathleen………Principal…..Voting………… Phone: 202-414-1295 Fax: 202-414-1217
Email: kathleen.m.oreilly@usa.xerox.com
1401 H Street NW Suite 200 XEROX CORP
Washington, DC 20005 USA
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Note: Voting/Advisory indicates the Organization's Membership type and not their current voting status.