Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!lsuc!dave
From: dave@lsuc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sources.wanted,comp.dcom.lans,comp.mail.misc
Subject: Re: X.400 Mail Package
Message-ID: <1875@lsuc.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 17-Jun-87 08:32:21 EDT
Article-I.D.: lsuc.1875
Posted: Wed Jun 17 08:32:21 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 18-Jun-87 01:47:46 EDT
References: <289@rabbit1.UUCP> <220@idacrd.UUCP> <493@rlgvax.UUCP> <959@mtunb.ATT.COM>
Reply-To: dave@lsuc.UUCP (David Sherman)
Organization: Law Society of Upper Canada, Toronto
Lines: 36
Summary: a standard is legislation

In article <959@mtunb.ATT.COM> dmt@mtunb.UUCP (Dave Tutelman) writes:
>>		 When are those standards
>>writers going to start writing documentation that is isn't so abstract,
>>terse, and hard to understand?
>
>	Probably never;  I'll even defend that's as it should be.
>	The purpose of the standard is unambiguous precision.

Dave is correct on this.  A standard in the computer industry,
once accepted, plays the same role as legislation in society.
Much legislation is difficult to read by non-lawyers, a fact which
causes some to criticize it.  But it's the same issue.

I don't expect non-lawyers to be able to read the Canadian
Income Tax Act, although millions of people are affected by it.
Nor to I expect the computer world at large, outside of the
people who implement {compilers, X.400 systems, whatever} to
understand such systems from their standards documents.

>	What there REALLY ought to be is a tutorial, readable statement
>	of what the standard says.  This tutorial should NOT be confused
>	with the standard itself; where there is a discrepancy, the
>	[unreadable] standard rules.

Absolutely.  In the case of complex legislation such as
amendments to the Income Tax Act, our Department of Finance
publishes an explanation of the amendments in readable English.
And, of course, for many areas of the law that affect the public
at large there are publications available that explain, in
understandable terms, most of what the law says.

David Sherman
The Law Society of Upper Canada
Toronto
-- 
{ seismo!mnetor  cbosgd!utgpu  watmath  decvax!utcsri  ihnp4!utzoo } !lsuc!dave