ISO/IEC FDIS 15944-10

Description / Abstract: Statement of Scope

This part of ISO/IEC 15944 serves as a methodology and tool for the use of widely used standards, specifications, authority files, etc., of a "codes representing X" nature in business transactions involving the making of (legally-binding) commitments, based on common business practices, and doing so in an IT-enabled manner. The key characteristics of coded domains include:

a) they are rule-based;

b) they have a Source Authority;

c) they are used in support of commitment exchange among Persons engaged in Open-edi business transactions through their IT systems;

d) they support requirements for unambiguousness in the semantics of the electronic data interchange (EDI) among autonomous parties while also supporting localization and multilingual human interface equivalency (HIE) requirements; and, e) they are IT-enabled as per the rules, criteria and specifications of this part of ISO/IEC 15944.

This part of ISO/IEC 15944 supports all three strategic directions for standards development of ISO/IEC JTC1: namely "portability", "interoperability", and "cultural adaptability".

A key objective of this part of ISO/IEC 15944 is to ensure that existing standards of a "codes representing X" nature can be used in electronic business transactions among parties engaged in Open-edi. Open-edi pertains to flows of information using information bundles which cause pre-defined (or pre-definable) changes in the states of the IT systems of the parties to such electronic data interchanges. Parties using Open-edi make the commitment that they will adhere to the predefined rules associated with the registered associated scenario attributes, roles and information bundles (including registered semantic components). The semantics here are identified and referenced via an identifier. With such ID codes can be associated multiple human interface equivalents in many forms and languages. Use of this part of ISO/IEC 15944 therefore facilitates semantic interoperability requirements in support of "cultural adaptability".

Another purpose of this part of ISO/IEC 15944 is to specify the key elements of an IT-enabled coded domain, whose membership is determined by a Source Authority, for use in support of electronic data interchange (EDI) among autonomous parties engaged in commitment exchange. The approach taken is that of the separation of the IT interface requirements of semantic interoperability from their (multiple) human interface linguistic equivalents. This will also ensure that the level of certainty and explicitness required in the completeness of the semantics of the recorded information interchange is appropriate to the goal of the business transaction, i.e. the unambiguous requirement.

Exclusions

Excluded from the scope of this part of ISO/IEC 15944 is that of the development of the scope, attributes, content values (as HIEs) of coded domains, etc., as required elements for other coded domain Registration Authorities (RAs), i.e. other than those developed by ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 32 itself as the Source Authority (SA).

However, the application of this part of ISO/IEC 15944 as a methodology and tool to turn an existing set of "codes representing X..." into an IT-enabled coded domain, conforming to this part of ISO/IEC 15944, is not excluded.¹¹

Aspects currently not yet addressed

The first edition of this part of ISO/IEC 15944 focuses on the essential, most basic aspects, i.e. primitive aspects. It is anticipated that some or all of these requirements will be addressed in future editions of this part of ISO/IEC 15944, or in companion standards or technical reports (including possible new parts of the multipart ISO/IEC 15944 standard). The development of new parts of ISO/IEC 15944 on Open-edi descriptive techniques is expected to provide a more detailed specification about IT-enabled presentations of coded domains.

Addressing "Quadrant B, C - Language accessibility and human interface equivalencies (HIEs) in e-learning applications- Part 1: Framework and reference model for semantic interoperability.

¹³ For example, see Annex H (informative) "Levels of international regulatory regimes" in ISO/IEC 15944-5.