Usenet 1994 January/usenetsourcesnewsgroupsinfomagicjanuary1994.iso/sources/std_unix/volume.14/text0032.txt

Internet Message Format | 1989-01-07 | 16.4 KB

From: [e-mail] (Moderator, John S. Quarterman)

This is the latest in a series of similar comp.std.unix articles.
Corrections and additions to this article are solicited.

There are two companion articles, posted at the same time as this one
and with subjects ``Access to UNIX User Groups and Publications'' and
``Calendar of UNIX-related Events.''

Also note that Shane McCarron now writes a quarterly summary report for
USENIX soon after each IEEE 1003 meeting for posting in comp.std.unix
and in ;login:, the Newsletter of the USENIX Association.

Changes from last posting:  NBS workshops.  USENIX Standards Watchdog.

Access information is given in this article for the following standards:
IEEE 1003.1 (operating system interface), 1003.2 (shell and tools),
    1003.3 (testing and verification), 1003.4 (real time),
    1003.5 (ADA binding), 1003.6 (security), 1003.0 (POSIX guide).
NBS FIPS.
/usr/group Technical Committee Subcommittees on distributed file system,
    network interface, graphics/windows, database, internationalization,
    performance measurements, realtime, security, and super computing.
X3H3.6 (display committee)
X3J11 (C language)
/usr/group 1984 Standard
System V Interface Definition (SVID, or The Purple Book)
X/OPEN PORTABILITY GUIDE (The Green Book)
4.3BSD Manuals


UNIX is a Registered Trademark of AT&T.
IEEE is a trademark of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers,
    Inc.:  POSIX is no longer a trademark.
X/OPEN is a licensed trademark of the X/OPEN Group Members.


The IEEE P1003 Portable Operating System Interface for Computer
Environments Committee is sometimes known colloquially as the UNIX
Standards Committee.  They published the 1003.1 "POSIX" Trial Use
Standard in April 1986.  According to its Foreword:

    The purpose of this document is to define a standard
    operating system interface and environment based on the
    UNIX Operating System documentation to support application
    portability at the source level.  This is intended for
    systems implementors and applications software developers.

Published copies are available at $19.95, with bulk purchasing discounts
available.  Call the IEEE Computer Society in Los Angeles

        714-821-8380

and ask for Book #967.  Unfortunately, this only works for multiple copies.
But the following mail address works for single copies:

        IEEE Computer Society
        P.O. Box 80452
        Worldway Postal Center
        Los Angeles, Ca. 90080

Include a check for $19.95 + $4 for shipping and handling.  For UPS
shipping, add another $4.  Or contact:

        IEEE Service Center
        445 Hoes Ln.
        Piscataway, NJ 08854

and ask for "IEEE 1003.1 Trial Use Standard" - stock number SH10546.

The Trial Use Standard will be available for comments for a period such
as a year.  The current target for a Full Use Standard is Summer 1988.
Initial balloting is completed, and ballot resolution is in progress:
it's too late to ballot if you haven't already.


IEEE has brought the 1003.1 effort into the International Organization
for Standardization (ISO) arena.  IEEE 1003.1 Draft 12 is also a
``Draft Proposed International Standard (ISO DP)'' under SC22 WG15.
The convenor is Jim Isaak:  see below for his address.  There is a U.S.
Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to ISO SC22 WG15:  the chair is Donn
Terry of HP.

TAG meetings tend to be held wherever 1003.1 is meeting.
The next ISO SC22 WG15 meeting is:

1988 Oct 17-19,20-21    ISO SC22 & WG15    Tokyo, Japan


The National Bureau of Standards is producing a Federal Information
Processing Standard (FIPS) based on IEEE 1003.1.  It will probably
be available before the Full Use Standard, and may reflect Draft 12,
rather than the final 1003.1 standard.  For information, contact:

        Roger Martin
        National Bureau of Standards
        Building 225
        Room B266
        Gaithersburg, MD  20899
        [phone]

NBS is also producing a FIPS based on IEEE 1003.2, probably from
the draft made by 1003.2 at their March meeting.

NBS sponsors a number of standards-related workshops, including:
1988 Sep 22    System Administration and Shell & Tools
1988 Sep 23    X Windows and POSIX FIPS
1988 Oct 5    POSIX Conformance Testing & Laboratory Accreditation
1988 Nov 15    POSIX Applications
1988 Nov 16    POSIX FIPS Revision
1989 Jan 17    Terminal Interface Extensions and Network Services
1989 May 16    POSIX Applications


Machine readable copies of the IEEE 1003.1 Trial Use Standard are not
and will not be available.  The same applies to copies of later drafts.

There is a paper mailing list by which interested parties may get
copies of drafts of the standard.  To get on it, or to submit comments
directly to the committee, mail to:

        James Isaak
        Chairperson, IEEE/CS P1003
        Tel.: [phone]
        Fax.: [phone]
        decvax!isaak
        [e-mail]
        Digital Equipment
        ZK03-3/Y25
        110 Spit Brook Rd.
        Nashua, NH  03062-2698

Sufficiently interested parties may join the working group.

The term POSIX actually applies to all of the P1003 subcommittees:
group    subject                co-chairs
1003.0    POSIX Guide            Al Hankinson (NBS), Kevin Lewis (DEC)
1003.1    Systems Interface        Jim Isaak (DEC), Donn Terry (HP)
1003.2    Shell and Tools Interface    Hal Jespersen (UniSoft), Don Cragun (Sun)
1003.3    Verification and Testing     Roger Martin (NBS), Carol Raye (AT&T)
1003.4    Real Time             Bill Corwin (Intel)
1003.5    Ada Binding for POSIX        Terry Fong (USArmy), Stowe Boyd(Compass)
1003.6    Security            Dennis Steinauer (NBS), Ron Elliot (IBM)

Inquiries regarding any of the subcommittees should go to the same address
as for 1003.1.


The next scheduled meetings of the P1003 working groups are:

1988 October 17-19,20-21 ISO SC22 Advisory Group & WG15 - Tokyo, Japan
1988 Oct 24-28    IEEE 1003    Hawaii
1989 Jan 9-13    IEEE 1003    Embassy Suites, Ft. Lauderdale, FL
1989 Apr 17(29?)    IEEE 1003    Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN
1989 Jul 10-14    IEEE 1003    San Francisco, CA
1989 Oct 16-20    IEEE 1003    Brussels (or Amsterdam)
1990 Jan 29    IEEE 1003    New Orleans, LA
1990 Apr    IEEE 1003    Montreal, Quebec

Here are some details from Hal Jespersen regarding P1003.2:

The IEEE P1003.2 "Shell and Utilities" Working Group is developing a
proposed standard to complement the 1003.1 POSIX standard.  It will
consist of

    a shell command language (currently planned to be based on the
    Bourne Shell),

    groups of utility programs, or commands,

    programmatic interfaces to the shell (system(), popen()) and
    related facilities (regular expressions, file name expansion,
    etc.)

    defined environments (variables, file hierarchies, etc) that
    applications may rely upon

    utilities for installing application programs onto conforming
    systems

which will allow application programs to be developed out of existing
pieces, in the UNIX tradition.  The scope of the standard emphasizes
commands and features that are more typically used by shell scripts or
C language programs than those that are oriented to the terminal user
with windows, mice, visual shells, and so forth.

There has been some controversy in the Working Group about clarifying
the scope of the 1003.2 standard in regard to its relationship with
1003.1.  The Working Group is attempting to produce a standard that
will assume the structure and philosophy of a POSIX system is
available, but it will not require a fully conforming implementation as
a base.  For example, it should be feasible to eventually produce a
1003.2 interface on a V7 system, or on a system very close to POSIX,
but missing a few crucial features (as long as the shell and utilities
didn't need them).  However, the proposed standard will *not* be
unnecessarily watered down simply to allow non-POSIX systems to conform.

The group is currently seeking proposals for groupings of commands that
may be offered by implementors.  As groups are identified, command
descriptions will be solicited.  There is no requirement that the commands
be in System V or BSD today, but they should realistically be commands
that are commonly found in most existing implementations.


There are four Institutional Representatives to P1003:  John Quarterman
from USENIX, Heinz Lycklama from /usr/group, Mike Lambert from X/OPEN,
and Clem Cole from OSF.  The two from USENIX and /usr/group are also
representatives to the U.S. TAG to ISO SC22 WG15.

There is a USENIX Standards Watchdog Committee of volunteers who report
on issues raised in standards committee meetings; composite reports are
published quarterly in comp.std.unix, in ;login: (the USENIX Association
Newsletter), and in the trade press.  Occasionally, these volunteers may
speak for USENIX, if authorized by the USENIX Standards Policy Committee,
which currently consists of Alan G. Nement (USENIX President), John S.
Quarterman, Shane P. McCarron (IEEE 1003 Secretary), and Grover Righter.
Comments, suggestions, etc., may be sent to

        John S. Quarterman
        Texas Internet Consulting
        701 Brazos, Suite 500
        Austin TX 78701-3243
        [phone]
        uunet!usenix!jsq
        [e-mail]
        [e-mail]

For comp.std.unix:
Comments:    uunet!std-unix-request [e-mail]
Submissions:    uunet!std-unix        [e-mail]

CommUNIXations (the /usr/group magazine) contains reports about every
other issue by Heinz Lycklama on the /usr/group Technical Committee meetings.

If you are interested in starting another /usr/group working group, contact
Heinz Lycklama:

        Heinz Lycklama
        Interactive Systems Corp.
        2401 Colorado Ave., 3rd Floor
        Santa Monica, CA 90404
        [phone]
        decvax!cca!ima!heinz


Here is contact information for /usr/group working groups as taken from
the CommUNIXations article mentioned above.

/usr/group Working Group on Distributed File System:
    Art Sabsevitz            Frederick Glover
    AT&T Information Systems    MK02-1/H10
    190 River Road            Digital Equipment Corporation
    Summit, NJ  07933        Continental Boulevard
    201-522-6248            Merrimack, NH  03054-0430
    attunix!bump            603-884-5111
                    decvax!fglover

/usr/group Working Group on Network Interface:
    Steve Albert
    AT&T Information Systems
    190 River Road, Rm. A-114
    Summit, NJ  07901
    [phone]
    attunix!ssa

/usr/group Working Group on Internationalization:
    John Wu                Laurie Goudie
    Charles River Data Systems    Santa Cruz Operation
    983 Concord St.,        400 Encinal
    Framingham, MA 01701        Santa Cruz, CA 95060
    617-626-1000            408-458-1422

/usr/group Working Group on Graphics/Windows:
    Tom Greene
    Apollo Computer, Inc.
    330 Billerica Road
    Chelmsford, MA  01824
    [phone], ext. 7581

/usr/group Working Group on Realtime:
    Bill Corwin
    Intel Corp.
    5200 Elam Young Pkwy
    Hillsboro, OR 97123
    [phone]

/usr/group Working Group on Database:
    Val Skalabrin
    Unify Corp.
    1111 Howe Ave.
    Sacramento, CA 95825
    [phone]


/usr/group Working Group on Performance Measurements:
    Ram Chelluri        David F. Hinnant
    AT&T Computer Systems    Northern Telecom, Inc.
    Room E15B        Dept. 0226
    4513 Western Ave.    P.O. Box 13010
    Lisle, IL 60532        Research Triangle Park, NC  27709-3010
    [phone]        [phone]
                ...{decvax,akgua}!mcnc!rti!ntirtp!dfh

/usr/group Working Group on Security:
    Steve Sutton            Ms. Jeanne Baccash
    Consultant, Addamax        AT&T UNIX Systems Engineering
    1107 S. Orchard            190 River Road
    Urbana, IL  61801        Summit, NJ  07901
    217-344-0996            201-522-6028
                    attunix!jeanne

/usr/group Working Group on Super Computing:
    Karen Sheaffer            Robin O'Neill
    Sandia National Laboratory    Lawrence Livermore Laboratory
    P.O. Box 969            P.O. Box 5509, L560
    Livermore, CA  94550        Livermore, CA  94550
    415-422-3431            415-422-0973
                    oneill#[e-mail]


The X3H3.6 display management committee has recently formed to develop
a model to support current and future window management systems, yet
is not based directly on any existing system.  The chair solicits
help and participation:

        Georges Grinstein
        wanginst!ulowell!grinstein


The Abstract of the 1003.1 Trial Use Standard adds:

    This interface is a complement to the C Programming Language
    in the C Information Bulletin prepared by Technical Committee X3J11
    of the Accredited Standards Committee X3, Information Processing
    Systems, further specifying an environment for portable application
    software.

X3J11 is sometimes known as the C Standards Committee.  Their liaison to
P1003 is

        Don Kretsch
        AT&T
        190 River Road
        Summit, NJ 07901

A contact for information regarding publications and working groups is

        Thomas Plum
        Vice Chair, X3J11 Committee
        Plum Hall Inc.
        1 Spruce Avenue
        Cardiff, New Jersey 08232

The current document may be ordered from

        Global Engineering Documents
        2805 McGaw
        Irvine, CA 92714
        USA
        [phone]
        [phone]

Ask for the X3.159 draft standard.  The price is $65.

The current X3J11 meeting schedule is:

1988 August 15-19    Cupertino, CA
1988 December 12-16    Seattle, WA
1989 April 10-11    Phoenix, AZ


The /usr/group Standard is a principal ancestor of P1003.1, X/OPEN,
and X3J11.  It may be ordered for $15.00 from:

        /usr/group Standards Committee
        4655 Old Ironsides Drive, Suite 200
        Santa Clara, California 95054
        Tel: [phone]
        Fax: [phone]

/usr/group also publishes an eight page document, ``Your Guide to POSIX,''
explaining what IEEE 1003 is, and a nineteen page document, ``POSIX Explored,''
about technical aspects of IEEE 1003.1, and its relations to other standards
and historical implementations.  Contact /usr/group at the above address
for details.


The System V Interface Definition (The Purple Book, or SVID).
This is the AT&T standard and is one of the most frequently-used
references of the IEEE 1003 committee.

        AT&T Customer Information Center
        Attn:  Customer Service Representative
        P.O. Box 19901
        Indianapolis, IN 46219
        U.S.A.

        800-432-6600 (Inside U.S.A.)
        800-255-1242 (Inside Canada)
        317-352-8557 (Outside U.S.A. and Canada)

    System V Interface Definition, Issue 2
    should be ordered by the following select codes:

    Select Code:    Volume:        Topics:
    320-011        Volume I    Base System
                    Kernel Extension
    320-012        Volume II    Basic Utilities Extension
                    Advanced Utilities Extension
                    Software Development Extension
                    Administered System Extension
                    Terminal Volume Interface Extension
    320-013        Volume III    Base System Addendum
                    Terminal Interface Extension
                    Network Services Extension
    307-131        I, II, III    (all three volumes)

The price is about 37 U.S. dollars for each volume or $84 for all three.
Major credit cards are accepted for telephone orders:  mail orders
should include a check or money order, payable to AT&T.


The X/OPEN PORTABILITY GUIDE (The Green Book)
is another reference frequently used by IEEE 1003.

The X/OPEN Group is "Ten of the world's major information system
suppliers" (at time of publication, Bull, DEC, Ericsson, Hewlett-Packard,
ICL, NIXDORF, Olivetti, Philips, Siemens and Unisys and subsequently
augmented by AT&T) who have produced a document intended to promote
the writing of portable applications.  They closely follow both SVID
and POSIX, and cite the /usr/group standard as contributing, but
X/OPEN's books cover a wider area than any of those.

The book is published by

        Elsevier Science Publishers B.V.
        Book Order Department
        P.O. Box 1991
        1000 BZ Amsterdam
        The Netherlands

and distributed in the U.S.A. and Canada by:

        Elsevier Science Publishing Company, Inc.
        52 Vanderbilt Avenue
        New York, NY 10017
        U.S.A.

There are currently five volumes:
    1) System V Specification Commands and Utilities
    2) System V Specification System Calls and Libraries
    3) System V Specification Supplementary Definitions
    4) Programming Languages
    5) Data Management

They take a large number of credit cards and other forms of payment.

Comments, suggestions, error reports, etc., for Issue 2 of the Green Book
may be mailed directly to:

        [e-mail]
        uunet!mcvax!inset!xopen!xpg2

Information about X/OPEN can be requested from:

        Mike Lambert
        Technical Director
        X/OPEN Ltd
        c/o ICL BRA01
        Lovelace Road
        Bracknell
        Berkshire
        England
        [phone]
        [e-mail]
        uunet!mcvax!inset!xopen!mgl


Finally, 4.2BSD and 4.3BSD have influenced POSIX in a number of areas.
The best reference on them is the 4.3BSD manuals, published by USENIX.
An order form may be obtained from:

        Howard Press
        c/o USENIX Association
        P.O. Box 2299
        Berkeley, CA 94710

        415-528-8649
        {ucbvax,decvax}!usenix!office

4.3BSD User's Manual Set (3 volumes)        $25.00
    User's Reference Manual
    User's Supplementary Documents
    Master Index

4.3BSD Programmer's Manual Set (3 volumes)    $25.00
    Programmer's Reference Maual
    Programmer's Supplementary Documents, Volume 1
    Programmer's Supplementary Documents, Volume 2

4.3BSD System Manager's Manual (1 volume)    $10.00

Unfortunately, there are some license restrictions.
Contact the USENIX office for details.

Volume-Number: Volume 14, Number 34