L2/01-111

CEN/TC304 N969

Subject/Title: Work Overview

Source: Wolf Arfvidson, chair of TC304

Date 1 March 2001

Note: This document, in the form of slides, was presented in meetings 22-23 Feb 2001 to give an overview of the work of TC304

CEN TC304
and related CEN workshops


Brussels 2001-02-22
Wolf Arfvidson
Statskontoret
wolf.arfvidson@statskontoret.se
Tel +46-8-454 46 99

Table of contents

• TC304 structure, scope
• History, development
• Standards
• CWAs
• Reports
• Halted work
• Ongoing work
• Future activities
• Continuous questions

TC304

• Titel: ICT - European Localization Requirements
• Scope: European linguistic and cultural localization in IT-standards
• Technical Committee with project teams, ad hoc groups and workshops; working groups possible
• Related CEN Workshops for same area
• Related to ISO/IEC JTC1/SC2 and SC35 and SC22/WG20 ...

Scope

Standardization in the field of information technology as applied to character sets, to ensure that European requirements are satisfied. The work will be in the areas of the identification, manipulation and coded representation of character data and in its input, interchange and rendition by electronic means.

From 1999: Standardization in the field of Information and Communications Technologies, to ensure that European localization requirements can be satisfied. Localization in this context means the provision of software and hardware support adapted to local linguistic and cultural needs in Europe.

History, development

• 1986- CSC Character Sets and Coding
• 1992- CEN TC304 Eur. Character Sets
• 1994- Own TC WSs Lux, Bled, Dublin
• 1996- WG >>> PT
• 1996- CEC large financing package for more than 20 WIs
• 1996-2000 4 Calls for experts
• 1997- WIs + PTs ® CEN WSs
• 1999 New titel, scope Eur. Loc. Req.
• Standards
• Former CEN ENV 4150x-standards: 8-bit (Latin 1) coding, Teletex, Videotex, Telex, Line coding, Eastern European coding ENV 1260 Cyrillic ENV 1973 16 bit MES and EES Þ CWA/MES
• Current EN 1922 Telex EN 1923 8-bit coding IS 15987 ¯ ENV 12005 European Cultural Registry ENV 13710 European Ordering Rules (1)

CWAs (in WSs)

• European generic locales (Eurolocale) Part 1: General Specifications Part 2: Narrative cultural specifications, POSIX locales and repertoire map CWA 14051-1:2000, CWA 14051-2:2000
• Multilingual European Subsets in IS 10646 CWA/MES:2000
• ESR European Culturally Specific Requirements, phase 1 CWA 14094:2001

CEN reports and other reports

• General Model for graphic character transformations CR 13907
• Guide for users CR 13928
• European keyboards CR no. not avail.
• Report on the euro in IT-standardization - a report to CEC 1999-04-23

Halted/changed/cancelled work

• Support population of Cultural Registry
• ESR European culturally specific requirements, phase 2 - CR or CWA
• European Fallback Rules - change to CR (these due to halted financing) R 7/00
• R&D output/experiences (TAP/LE) (changed to PWC study)
• ERR European regulatory requirements, phase 1 + 2 - CR or CWA (cancelled)
• ALPHA Character repertoires of Europe (cancelled in WS)

Ongoing Work

• Matching - phase 1 (internal study rep.) (Phase 2 would be CR/ENV/CWAs)
• European Ordering Rules - 2 (ENV) R 12/00
• Testing of euro sign + letters for OCR-B
• European extension to (ISO) repertoire of OCR-B (EN/ENV) (built on testing results)
• Revision work on EN 1923 (Inclusion of euro sign and missing European letters in EN/ENV 1923 - nat contrib. draft) R 6/00
• Taxonomy - change to map activities?
• CWA Eurolocale (1) >>> ENV R 8/00

Future activities NEW CEN TC304

• CEN/ISSS Focal point Cultural Diversity
• National requirements presented via TC small countries’ needs
• Requirements due to EU-enlargement
• Create virtual reference groups?
• Initiate Work Items for TC and CEN WS
• Maintain adopted products
• Transform CWA into EN/ENV and EN/ENV/CWA into ISO standards
• Awareness actions (semin., rev.website...)

Continuous questions

• Market needs and customers?
• European or international?
• New work items? Move these to WSs? EN/ENV or CR or CWA?
• Open up for more expertise particip. R 1/00
• Relations to other bodies CEN TCs, CEN WSs, ETSI, ISO/IEC 1/35, 1/22/20… Consortia and CEC and governments
• Awareness incl availability of products
• Financing