ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 18

Document Processing and Related Communication

ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC18 N 5459

DATE: 1996.10.21

REPLACES

DOC TYPE: Summary of Voting/Table of Replies

TITLE: Table of Replies on SC 18 N 5399, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 18 New Work
Item Proposal on Standard HTML

SOURCE: Secretariat, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 18

PROJECT:

STATUS: This NP has been approved by SC 18. The results are being
forwarded to SC 18 for information and to SC 18/WG 8 for preparation of
a disposition of comments report and a recommendation on further
progression of the work.

ACTION ID: FYI

DUE DATE:

DISTRIBUTION: P and L Members

Working Group Conveners & Secretariats

MEDIUM: D

DISKETTE NO.: 36

NO. OF PAGES: 7

Secretariat, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 18, American National Standards

Institute, 11 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036; Telephone: +1

212 642 4976; Facsimile: +1 212 398 0023; Email: mtopping@ansi.org

**SUMMARY OF VOTING**

**Document Title: SC 18 N 5399 - ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 18 New Work Item
Proposal on Standard HTML**

**SC 18 National Body P-Members (23)**

Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Denmark,
Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, The
Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, Turkey,
UK, USA

**[NP Ballot]{.underline}**

**P-Members in Favour (15 of 23)**

Australia (Attach. 1), Brazil, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland,
Germany (Attach. 2), Ireland, Japan (Attach. 3), The Netherlands
(Attach. 4), Norway, Romania, Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, USA
(Attach. 5)

**P-Members Voting Against (0 of 23)**

**P-Members Abstaining (1 of 23)**

Turkey

**P-Members who did not vote (7 of 23)**

Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, Republic of Korea, UK

**[PARTICIPATION]{.underline}**

**[P-Members who will participate (7 of 23)]{.underline}**

Australia, Brazil, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, USA

**[USER REQUIREMENTS]{.underline}**

**P-Members in Favour (11 of 23)**

Australia, Brazil, Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, Norway, Romania,
Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, Turkey

**P-Members Voting Against (1 of 23)**

USA

**P-Members Abstaining (0 of 23)**

**P-Members who did not vote (11 of 23)**

Belgium, Canada, China, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Republic
of Korea, The Netherlands, UK

**Attachment 1 - Australia**

Australia votes with APPROVAL on this document, however, would like

the following comments to be takeninto account regarding User
Requirements

AUST-1

General

User Requirements

1\. That the readership of the proposed standard are the users of

the DTD and system implementors.

2\. That simplicity of implementation of Standard HTML should be

regarded as important: consequently

the proposed standard may designate types of valid SGML markup that

a Standard HTML parser may

recognise but discard, ignore or report as an error.

**Attachment 2 - Germany**

Germany

DIN votes NO on the New Work Item Proposal on Standard HTML for the
following reasons:

\- The user requirements (SC 18 N 5401) and the New Work Item Proposal
are inconsistent in many aspects (e.g., in N 5401 the IETF version 3.2
of HTML shall become the basis for the proposed standard whereas in N
5399 it is stated - without any explanation - "thst many of the latest
features are of minimal use").

\- HTML is an existing IETF Standard. Calling an ISO/IEC standard also
HTML would be totally confusing, in particular since it is obviously
intended that the proposed ISO/IEC standard should be different from the
IETF.

\- Even if the name for the proposed ISO/IEC standard would be chosen
differently than the name under which the IETF standard is known, namely
HTML, there exists no market justification for the development of a
standard that shall be "a stable format for documents displayed on the
World-Wide (WWW)". WWW browsers immplement the processing of IETF HTML
documents (and extensions thereof) and DIN believes that it is totally
unrealistic that the major WWW browser developers would implement a SGML
DTD different from the IETF HTML specification.

**Attachment 3 - Japan**

The National Body of Japan agrees the user requirements contained in
SC18

N5401 with the following comments.

Source:\_\$@!!\_(JThe National Body of Japan

Status:\_\$@!!\_(JEditorial Comments on SC18 N5401

Date\_\$@!!\_(J:\_\$@!!\_(JAug. 21, 1996

\(1\) line 5 and 6

\"HTML\" should be \"the HTML\".

\(2\) line 7

Clarify the meaning of \"viewable\".

**Attachment 4 - The Netherlands**

The Netherlands approves with comment.

There are a number of questions about this NWI. Firstly IETF will not be
maintaining this standard. W3 consortium is maintaining and revising
this standard and will continue to do so. W3C has no liaison with ISO.
HTML 3.2DTD should not be made the standard, but current HTML DTD
available from W3C should be the standard.

**Attachment 5 - USA**

The US National Body recommends the approval of the NP with

comments. If this NP is approved we will participate in the

work. The user requirements contained in Sc18 N5401 are not

correct and adequate as shown in the attached comments.

U.S. comments on N5401

The second sentence of the \"Purpose and justification\" is no

longer accurate and should be deleted.

The User Requirements should be modified as follows:

The chief requirement for this standard is to stabilize an

official W3C-developed version of HTML, and/or one or more valid

subsets thereof, for the following purposes:

1\. To standardize a common SGML application for universal

interchange.

2\. To allow HTML to be used in environments were ISO

standards are required.