Access to UNIX-Related Standards

Moderator, John S. Quarterman std-unix at uunet.uu.net
Mon Oct 30 11:39:48 AEST 1989


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

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

Also note that Jeff Haemer 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: IEEE 1003.* meeting dates and locations

Access information is given in this article for the following standards:
ISO/IEC TC1 SC22 WG15 (POSIX)
ISO/IEC TC1 SC22 WG14 (C language)
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),
	1003.7 (system administration), 
	1003.8 (distributed services),
	1003.9 (FORTRAN binding),
	1003.10 (supercomputing),
	1003.0 (POSIX guide).
	1224 (message handling services)
	1201 (interfaces for user portability)
UniForum Technical Committee Subcommittees on;
	distributed file system,
	network interface, 
	internationalization,
	realtime, 
	database, 
	performance measurements, 
	security, 
	super computing,
	usability,
	transaction processing, and
	C++.
NIST:  FIPS 
X3H3.6 (display committee)
X3J11 (C language)
/usr/group 1984 Standard
System V Interface Definition (SVID, or The Purple Book)
X/OPEN PORTABILITY GUIDE 
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 of IEEE or of anyone else.
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" Full Use
Standard in October 1988 after its formal approval 22 August 1988.
This is an interface and environment standard; implementation details
are explicitly excluded.  Although it is based on documentation for
various versions of the UNIX Operating System, it is explicitly not
UNIX, which is an implementation licensed by a certain vendor.  Source
level application portability is the goal.

The standard may be ordered from:

		+1-201-981-0060
		IEEE Service Center
		445 Hoes Lane
		Piscataway, NJ  08854
		U.S.A.

The price is $16 (plus tax, shipping, and handling).


IEEE 1003.1 is also a ``Draft Proposed International Standard (ISO DP)''
under a joint committee of the International Organization for Standardization
(ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Committee (IEC),
Technical Committee 1, Subcommittee 22, Working Group 15 (ISO/IEC JTC1
SC22 WG15).  The convenor is Jim Isaak:  see below for his address.  
Dominic Dunlop is the EUUG and USENIX representative to ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG15 
and WG14. There is a U.S. Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to 
ISO/IEC JTC1 SC22 WG15: the chair is Donn Terry of HP, who is also the 
current chair of IEEE 1003.1.

		Donn Terry
		hpda!hpfcla!donn
		+1-303-229-2367
		Hewlett Packard Systems Division
		3404 E. Harmony Road
		Fort Collins, CO  80525
		U.S.A.

TAG meetings tend to be held wherever 1003.1 is meeting.


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
		+1-603-881-0480
		fax: +1-603-881-0120
		decvax!isaak
		isaak at decvax.dec.com
		Digital Equipment
		ZK03-3/Y25
		110 Spit Brook Rd.
		Nashua, NH  03062-2698
		U.S.A.

Sufficiently interested parties may join the working group.


The term POSIX actually applies to all of the P1003 subcommittees:
group	subject				chairs, vice-chair
1003.0	POSIX Guide			Al Hankinson (NIST), 
					Kevin Lewis (DEC)
1003.1	Systems Interface		Donn Terry (HP)
1003.2	Shell and Tools Interface  	Hal Jespersen (POSIX Software Group), 
					Don Cragun (Sun)
1003.3	Verification and Testing 	Roger Martin (NIST), 
					N. Ray Wilkes (UNISYS)
1003.4	Real Time 			Bill Corwin (Intel), 
					Mike Cossey
1003.5	Ada Binding for POSIX		Terry Fong (USArmy), 
					Steven Deller (Verdix)
1003.6	Security			Dennis Steinauer (NIST), 
					Ron Elliot (IBM)
1003.7	System Administration		Steve Carter (Bellcore), 
					David Hinnant (BNR), Martin Kirk (BTRL)
1003.8	Distributed Services
	Net SC				Timothy Baker (Ford Aero), 
					David Dodge (Oracle)
	TFA SG				Jason Zions (HP)
	P2P SG				Steven Albert (AT&T)
	RPC SG				Ken Hobday (DEC)
	FTAM SG				Kester Fong (GM)
	NSDS SG				Lakshmi Arunachalam (Sun)
	1224 Message Handling Services (X.400) SG
					John Boebinger (DEC)
	
1003.9	Fortran Bindings		John McGrory (HP), 
					Michael J. Hannah (Sandia)
1003.10	Supercomputing SG		Karen Sheaffer (Sandia), 
					Jonathan C. Brown (Lawrence Livermore)
1003.11	Transaction Processing SG	Elliot J Brebner (Unisys), 
					Bob Snead (Interactive)
1201	Interfaces for User Portability	Sunil Mehta (Convergent), 
					Pat Casey (Shell)

Inquiries regarding any of the subcommittees should go to address for the
IEEE 1003 chair.

The next scheduled meetings of the P1003 working groups are:

1990 Jan 8-12	IEEE 1003	New Orleans, LA
1990 Apr 23-27	IEEE 1003	Salt Lake City, UT
1990 Jul 16-20	IEEE 1003	Danvers, MA


There are four Institutional Representatives to P1003:  John Quarterman
from USENIX, Heinz Lycklama from UniForum, Mike Lambert from X/OPEN,
and Alex Morrow from OSF, Shane McCarron from UNIX International.  
They are apparently all 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. Nemeth (USENIX President), John S.
Quarterman, and Shane P. McCarron (IEEE 1003 Secretary).
Comments, suggestions, etc., may be sent to

		John S. Quarterman
		Texas Internet Consulting
		701 Brazos, Suite 500
		Austin TX 78701-3243
		+1-512-320-9031
		uunet!usenix!jsq
		jsq at usenix.org
		jsq at longway.tic.com

For comp.std.unix:
Comments:	uunet!std-unix-request std-unix-request at uunet.uu.net
Submissions:	uunet!std-unix		std-unix at uunet.uu.net

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

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

		Heinz Lycklama
		Interactive Systems Corp.
		2401 Colorado Ave., 3rd Floor
		Santa Monica, CA 90404
		+1-213-453-8649
		decvax!cca!ima!heinz

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

UniForum Working Group on Distributed File System:
	Art Sabsevitz			
	AT&T Information Systems	
	190 River Road			
	Summit, NJ  07901		
	201-522-6248			
	attunix!bump			
					
UniForum Working Group on Network Interface:
	Steve Albert
	AT&T Information Systems
	190 River Road, Rm. A-114
	Summit, NJ  07901
	(201)522-6104
	attunix!ssa

UniForum Working Group on Internationalization:
	Loretta Goudie
	Santa Cruz Operation
	400 Encinal
	Santa Cruz, CA 95060
	408-458-1422

UniForum Working Group on Realtime:
	Bill Corwin
	Intel Corp.
	5200 Elam Young Pkwy
	Hillsboro, OR 97123
	(503)696-2248

UniForum Working Group on Database:
	Val Skalabrin
	Unify Corp.
	1111 Howe Ave.
	Sacramento, CA 95825
	(916)920-9092


UniForum Working Group on Performance Measurements:
	Ram Chelluri		
	AT&T Computer Systems	
	Room E15B		
	4513 Western Ave.	
	Lisle, IL 60532-1571	
	(312)810-6223		

UniForum Working Group on Security:
	Jeanne Baccash
	AT&T UNIX Systems Engineering
	190 River Road
	MS G-222
	Summit, NJ  07901
	201-522-6028
	attunix!jeanne

UniForum Working Group on Super Computing:
        Karen Sheaffer              
        Sandia National Laboratory  
	Div. 8235
        P.O. Box 969                
        Livermore, CA  94550        
        415-294-3431                
        karen at snll-arpagw.llnl.gov  

UniForum Working Group on Usability:
	Alan Weaver
	IBM Corporation 
        M/S D98/803 
	11400 Burnet Road
	Austin, TX 78750
	512-823-9094

UniForum Working Group on Transaction Processing:
	Bob Snead
        INTERACTIVE Systems Corp. 
        2950 Wilderness Place
	Suite B
	Boulder, CO 80301
	303-449-2870

UniForum Working Group on C++:
	Don Kretsch
        AT&T Information Systems
        190 River Road
	Summit, NJ  07901
	201-522-6499



The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST, formerly NBS,
the National Bureau of Standards) has produced a Federal Information
Processing Standard (FIPS) based on IEEE 1003.1 Draft 12, and approved
31 August 1988 as FIPS #151, Portable Operating System for Computer
Environments.  An update to the state of the 1003.1 Full Use Standard
is expected.  For information, contact:

		Roger Martin
		National Institute of Standards and Technology
		Technology Building, Room B266
		Gaithersburg, MD 20899
        	+1-301-975-3295
        	rmartin at swe.icst.nbs.gov

NIST has a POSIX Conformance Test Suite (PCTS) for 1003.1 which is 
currently in preliminary external testing.

NIST is also producing a FIPS based on IEEE 1003.2, and has started
one on system administration.

NIST sponsors a number of standards-related workshops, including:
1989 Sep 25	POSIX Conformance Testing & Laboratory Accreditation
1989 Nov 15	POSIX Application Portability Profile
1990 Apr 9	POSIX Application Portability Profile
1990 Nov 15	POSIX Application Portability Profile
 


The X3H3.6 display management committee is in the final stages of
standardization of the X Window System Data Stream Encoding Version 11
(the "X Protocol"). They will soon begin the standardization of Xlib
and its various language bindings (C, ADA, Fortran) as well as begin
the standardization process within ISO.  The chair is
 
		Dr. Georges Grinstein
		grinstein at ulowell.edu



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
		+1-714-261-1455
		+1-800-854-7179

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

The current X3J11 meeting schedule is:

1989 Sep - Cancelled
1990 Mar 5-6 X3J11	New York City, NY


The /usr/group 1984 Standard is a principal ancestor of P1003.1, X/OPEN,
and X3J11.  It may be ordered for $15.00 from:

		UniForum Standards Committee
		2901 Tasman Drive, Suite 201
		Santa Clara, California 95054
		Tel: (408)986-8840
		Fax: (408)986-1645

UniForum 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 UniForum 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)
		+1-317-352-8557 (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 implementation of System V is described in the book

	The Design of the UNIX Operating System
	Maurice J. Bach
	Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey


The X/Open Portability Guide (XPG) 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

		Prentice-Hall
		Englewood Cliffs
		New Jersey  07632

There are currently seven volumes:
	1) XSI Commands and Utilities	
	2) XSI System Interface and Headers
	3) XSI Supplementary Definitions	
	4) Programming Languages		
	5) Data Management			
	6) Window Management			
	7) Networking Services			

	All 7 Volumes		

Comments, suggestions, error reports, etc., for Issue 3 of the X/OPEN 
Portability Guide may be mailed directly to:

		xpg3 at xopen.co.uk
		uunet!mcvax!inset!xopen!xpg3

Information about X/OPEN can be requested from:

		Mike Lambert
		X/Open
		Abbot's House
		Abbey Road
		Reading, Berkshire RG1 3BD
		England
		+44 256 843-142
		mgl at xopen.co.uk
		uunet!mcvax!inset!xopen!mgl


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

		+1-415-528-8649
		uunet!usenix!office
		office at usenix.org

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.


Information about the design and implementation of 4.3BSD can be found 
in the book

	The Design and Implementation of the 4.3 BSD UNIX Operating System
	Samuel J. Leffler, Marshall Kirk McKusick, Michael J. Karels, and
		John S. Quarterman
	Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts, 1989

Volume-Number: Volume 17, Number 52



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