MINUTES OF ATLANTIC UBL TC MEETING
WEDNESDAY 25 JUNE 2008
ATTENDANCE
Peter Borresen
Jon Bosak (chair)
Anne Hendry (guest, OASIS application pending)
Zarella Rendon
STANDING ITEMS
Additions to the calendar:
http://ubl.xml.org/events
PLB: CEN/ISSS BII Working Group 1 meeting, 9-10 September in
Turin; CEN/ISSS BII meeting, 11-12 September in Turin. The
rest of the BII schedule should be set by the first week in
July, at which time we should be able to revise the UBL
schedule accordingly.
Review of Pacific call
JB: The DELSC is now established, with web page and mailing
list up and running. Every OASIS business expert fluent in
German is invited to participate; contact Karsten Tolle
(tolle at dbis.cs.uni-frankfurt.de) to join.
ACTION: PLB to invite BII members from Germany and Austria
to participate.
No other comments on the Pacific call minutes.
Support page maintenance
No submissions this week. Note that this is being
transitioned to ubl.xml.org.
Financial Information Requirements Task Group
JB: From the Pacific minutes: "Stig Korsgaard of the Danish
Bankers Association informs us that a staff person will be
assigned to FIRTG at the request of the Danish government."
CUSTOMIZATION GUIDELINES
JB: Haven't heard back yet from the authors.
UNTDED ROAD MAP SURVEY
See
http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/ubl/200806/msg00015.html
From Pacific minutes:
"ACTION: The TC to study the draft (see URL above) and be
ready to discuss in next week's Pacific and Atlantic calls
with the objective of agreeing on a TC response to the
questionnaire."
AH: Do we have a representative to the UNTDED work going
forward?
JB: No, though I'm sure that one would be appreciated if anyone
wants to volunteer.
UBL 2.0 NDR EDITORIAL REVIEW
A work session has been scheduled for next Atlantic call (2
July).
ACTION: JB to request new PDF from BH.
We need to add a section on code list metadata; see
http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/ubl/200803/msg00001.html
2008 TC MEETING SCHEDULE
RESERVE HOTEL ROOM NOW FOR AUGUST MEETING IN MONTR�AL. You can
always cancel later.
Planned attendance so far:
JB: Europa
MC: Europa
ZR: Marriott
GKH: Residence Inn
AH: with MC if able to attend
BH: with ZR if able to attend
PLB: Will attend to work on schematron rules with GKH.
JB: We should aim to complete a first draft of the
Customization Guidelines at this meeting.
TC CONCALL SCHEDULE
See Pacific minutes.
OTHER BUSINESS
PLB: BII WG2 (convergence) editor has been assigned to
participate in TBG17.
JB: See Pacific minutes of 17 June.
PLB: There is still a lot of concern that the addition of
eTendering documents in UBL 2.1 somehow violates the agreement
we reached with UN/CEFACT in 2006. Please clarify in the
minutes.
JB: The agreement arrived at 28 March 2006 reads as follows:
Consistent with the Cooperation Agreement between OASIS and
UN/CEFACT of June 2005:
1. UN/CEFACT recognizes UBL 2 as appropriate
first-generation XML documents for eBusiness.
2. For OASIS and UN/CEFACT:
(a) future UN/CEFACT deliverables constitute the upgrade
path for UBL, and
(b) the maintenance of UBL 2 remains with the OASIS UBL
TC.
3. In the expectation that UN/CEFACT will produce its own
integrated set of XML schemas within a period of three
years, OASIS will produce no further major versions of
UBL past UBL 2.
4. OASIS will grant UN/CEFACT a perpetual, irrevocable
license to create derivative works based on UBL.
There are several important things to note here.
- The agreement specifically entitles the UBL TC to continue
to maintain UBL 2. "Maintainance" includes the addition of
new data items to meet new requirements. Document types are
data items. This was made very clear in negotiations with
the UN/CEFACT Bureau leading up to adoption of the
agreement.
- "UBL 2" means *all* versions of UBL 2: 2.1, 2.2, ... This
was made very clear in negotiations with the UN/CEFACT
Bureau leading up to adoption of the agreement.
- The agreement binds OASIS to issue no further *major*
versions of UBL during the three-year window we gave
UN/CEFACT to come up with a suitable replacement for UBL 2.
The meaning of "major version" is specified in both the UBL
Naming and Design Rules and in the then current (and still
current) UN/CEFACT Naming and Design Rules (not surprising,
since the UN/CEFACT version copied the UBL rule). Put
simply, a major version is one that breaks backward
compatibility with the previous major version. Nothing we
intend to do in UBL 2.1 will break backward compatibility
with UBL 2.0. According to both the UBL and the UN/CEFACT
definitions of "major version," we will not be issuing a new
major version and therefore are not in any way breaking the
agreement we reached with UN/CEFACT. The distinction
between major and minor versions was made perfectly clear in
negotiations with the UN/CEFACT Bureau leading up to
adoption of the agreement.
- While the considerations just listed are sufficient to
demonstrate that we are adhering to both the letter and the
intent of the agreement, the fact is that the three-year
window during which we agreed to issue no further major
versions of UBL will have expired by the time we issue UBL
2.1 as an OASIS Standard in 2Q2009. In reality, therefore,
we would be completely within the terms of the agreement
even if UBL 2.1 *were* a major version release -- which it
is not.
Jon Bosak
Chair, OASIS UBL TC