definitions

[Ralph Barker]

Submitted-by: ralph at svnet.UUCP (Ralph Barker)

In article <129555 at uunet.UU.NET>, cazier at mbunix.mitre.org (Cazier) writes:
> Submitted-by: cazier at mbunix.mitre.org (Cazier)
> 
> What national or international groups have published definitions for the
> following:
> 
> 	standards, specifications, standards categories, profiles
> 	functional areas, functional area profiles, layers, framework
> 
> or does anyone have comments on the items listed above regarding definitions?
> 
Depending on the nature of the work for which the definitions are needded, the
level of care in use of the terms may vary.  For example, an article for the 
trade press might use the terms rather loosely, while work on a draft of a 
proposed standard or "official" specification would require greater
care.  

Within the standards work going on within IEEE, ANSI, ISO and other
standards bodies, a considerable effort goes into coordinating the
definitions of terms.  The direction of the coordination is usually
"up", i.e. toward coordination with ISO definitions.  Chairs of
working groups are encouraged (pronounced "required by duty or
professionalism") to coordinate with each other as work progresses, so
that variations in the use of terms can be avoided.  

In some cases, as with the term "profile", slight twists may be
unavoidable.  For example, within the work going on within the
P1003.0, "profile" is used to refer to a collection of standards and
functional standards used to specify the requirements for a particular
application environment.  At the international level, however,
"national profiles" commonly refers to a set of locale definition
specifications for i18n purposes.  

Considering the amount of standards work "in the pipeline", it is
advisable to check both the published dictionaries of standards bodies
and pending work to avoid conflicts.  

-- 
Ralph Barker:                SVNet, 640 So Winchester Blvd, San Jose,CA 95128
uucp: ...{pyramid, sun, uunet}!amdahl!aleph!svnet!ralph        
			uunet!usrgrp!svnet!ralph        
         or,     attmail!ralmar!ralph                   Voice: (408) 248-8649


Volume-Number: Volume 23, Number 48