From hanisch@stsci.edu Thu Jan 29 07:22:59 2004
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 10:42:12 -0500
From: Robert Hanisch <hanisch@stsci.edu>
To: Robert Hanisch <hanisch@stsci.edu>, Peter Quinn <pjq@eso.org>,
     roy@cacr.caltech.edu, dtody@nrao.edu, jcm@cfa.harvard.edu,
     gtr@ast.cam.ac.uk, ael@star.le.ac.uk, masatoshi.ohishi@nao.ac.jp,
     francois@newb6.u-strasbg.fr
Cc: 'IVOA' <ivoa@ivoa.net>
Subject: Standards and Processes WG report (updated)

(Thanks to Marco for pointing out some additions!)

Status Report:  IVOA WG on Standards and Processes

  The WG on Standards and Processes brought forward IVOA Document Standards
V1.0 for approval to the status of Recommendation, with such approval agreed
by the IVOA Executive and the formal Recommendation released on 2003-10-24
(http://www.ivoa.net/Documents/REC/DocStandard/REC-DocumentStandards-2003102
4.pdf).  M. Leoni set up a structure for IVOA documents on the IVOA main web
site in which the four types of documents--Notes, Working Draft, Proposed
Recommendations, and Recommendations--can be easily located.  As of
2004-01-21 we have the following documents:

    Notes:
        [none]
    Working Drafts:
        Resource Metadata for the Virtual Observatory V1.0
    Proposed Recommendations:
        IVOA Identifiers V1.0
    Recommendations:
        IVOA Document Standards V1.0

I believe that we agreed at the Interoperability Workshop following ADASS,
in Strasbourg, that Resource Metadata for the Virtual Observatory V1.0
should be promoted to Proposed Recommendation status.  The next step is for
the chair of the Registry WG to call for the formal RFC in order to promote
the RM document to the level of Recommendation.

  Other documents of which I am aware that should be making their way
through this process include

    VOTable V1.1 (VOTable WG)
    Resource Metadata Schema Definitions  (Registry WG)
    Quantity Data Model  (Data Models WG)
    Simple Image Access Protocol  (Data Access Layer WG)
    Simple Spectral Access Protocol  (Data Access Layer WG)
    SkyNode Interface  (VO Query Language WG)
    Astronomical Data Query Language  (VO Query Language WG)
    Metadata Content within VO Resources  (UCD WG)
    Standard Interfaces  (Web and Grid Services WG)

Some of the documents have been formatted as IVOA Working Drafts but have
not yet been submitted to the Document Coordinator for inclusion in the
document library.  I would appreciate knowing if other documents are in
development.  We need to do a little housecleaning and get these documents
into their proper places in the document library.  All documents need to
enter the process as Working Drafts and follow the agreed-upon promotion
chain up to Proposed Recommendations and Recommendations.  We should
probably clarify the process for getting documents into the review and
promotion process with the WG chairs and the Document Coordinator (reachable
at ivoadoc@ivoa.net).

-- R. J. Hanisch, 2004-01-21