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From: wmb@MITCH.ENG.SUN.COM (Mitch Bradley)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: ANS Forth - the light at the end of the tunnel
Message-ID: <9006041404.AA15850@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: 4 Jun 90 07:41:32 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: Mitch Bradley <wmb%MITCH.ENG.SUN.COM@SCFVM.GSFC.NASA.GOV>
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 37

> > Seriously, I am quite pleased at the current state of affairs.

> Ok, but how widespread is that feeling?

The primary metric that the technical subcommittee used to prioritize
their work was the notion of "burning issues".  A "burning issue" is
something that one or more voting members feel so strongly about that
they will vote against the standard if the issue is not resolved to their
satisfaction.

This is a "big stick", since the CBEMA rules require that the final vote
on the standard as a whole must be UNANIMOUS.  (To become a voting member,
one must be present at 2 consecutive meetings and pay a membership fee ~$250
to CBEMA.  To remain a voting member, you must then attend at least every
other meeting.)

Relative to that metric, the answer to the question is that the recent
meeting put to rest most of the burning issues.  This implies that the
committee, by and large, is ready to vote for the draft standard "as is".
(I am speaking of the technical content and intent of Basis12; the
document itself has to recast in a different format, and cleaned up
here and there, hopefully without altering the technical intent).

It does not mean that everybody is overjoyed with every detail, but it
does mean that the thing as a whole is pretty much *acceptable* to nearly
everybody.

This sounds like a weak statement, but believe me, it's not!

Getting Forth programmers, and especially the highly-opinionated types
who are willing to endure the rigors of the standardization process,
to agree on ANYTHING is quite a feat.

If I can find time in the next few weeks, I'll try to post a list of
some of the "non-burning" issues that are still on the table.

Mitch Bradley