ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG5 N2172 WG5 Business Plan and Convener's Report for ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22 2018 Plenary PERIOD COVERED BY THIS REPORT: 16 June 2018 to 7 August 2019 SUBMITTED BY: Steve Lionel 1.0 MANAGEMENT SUMMARY 1.1 JTC1/SC22/WG5 STATEMENT OF SCOPE The development and maintenance of ISO/IEC Fortran programming language standards. 1.2 PROJECT REPORT 1.2.1 COMPLETED PROJECTS 1539-1:2018 Fortran 2018 was published November 2018. TS 29113:2012 "Further Interoperability of Fortran with C" was agreed to be withdrawn in a ballot completed March 2019, as its contents are included in Fortran 2018. WG5 requests of SC22 that this TS be withdrawn. TS 18508:2015 "Additional Parallel Features in Fortran" was agreed to be withdrawn in a ballot completed March 2019, as its contents are included in Fortran 2018. WG5 requests of SC22 that this TS be withdrawn. 1.2.2 PROJECTS UNDERWAY 22.02.01.01 Programming Language Fortran - Part 1: Base language WG5 is currently gathering requirements and drawing up a work item list for the next revision of the Fortran language. A new project has not yet been requested. The primary responsibility for maintenance of the base language has been delegated to INCITS/PL22.3. About 15 'interpretations' are under consideration. 22.02.02 Programming Language Fortran - Part 2: Varying Length Character Strings WG5 continues to have responsibility for maintenance of this part of the Fortran standard; there has been no maintenance activity during the period. WG5 intends to request withdrawal of this part, at the next SR, as it is obsolete. 1.2.3 CANCELLED PROJECTS None. 1.2.4 CO-OPERATION AND COMPETITION WG5 cooperates closely with the ANSI INCITS/PL22.3 Fortran Technical Committee, to whom it has delegated the technical development of Fortran as well as its maintenance. There is also contact and or liaison with several organisations including OpenMP Architecture Review Board MPI Forum IFIP WG2.5 - Numerical Software UPC Consortium SC22/WG9 Ada INCITS PL22.11 - C INCITS PL22.16 - C++ with several of the PL22.3 and WG5 members and vendors also being members of the other organisations. Many of those responsible for the development of commercial Fortran compilers are members of PL22.3 and/or WG5. Dan Nagle (PL22.3 chairman) has been actively involved with WG23 (Programming Language Vulnerabilities). A draft Fortran annex has been constructed and has been forwarded to WG23. Additional text for the new vulnerabilities is being prepared. There are no competitive activities. 2.0 PERIOD REVIEW 2.1 MARKET REQUIREMENTS Fortran is the language of choice for much scientific, engineering, and economic programming, particularly for very large programs that have evolved over many years. There has been some delay over the implementation of Fortran 2003, but Cray, IBM, Intel, and PGI now have full implementations and several other vendors have implemented most of the features. Cray and Intel now have full support for Fortran 2008. Other compilers have various degrees of completeness of Fortran 2003 and 2008. Features from Fortran 2018 have already started to appear in popular compilers. Most major Fortran compiler vendors are represented either on WG5 or its Primary Development Body, INCITS/PL22.3, as are three of the major research establishments that rely on Fortran for their scientific computing. In addition to vendor-supplied and specific mailing lists, there is an active email list and an active usenet newsgroup for users of Fortran, which provide valuable feedback from users. All these diverse sources are being used to guide the development of the language, both through revisions to the base language Standard, and through other related standards and technical reports. 2.2 ACHIEVEMENTS The main achievement during the period has been the completion and publication of Fortran 2018. 2.3 RESOURCES As elsewhere in the Standardization world, it is becoming increasingly difficult to persuade employers to provide the necessary funding for Standards activity. Most of the technical work involved in developing Standards and Technical Reports is performed by INCITS/PL22.3 under the strategic direction of WG5. All WG5 meetings since 2003 have been joint meetings with INCITS/PL22.3 in order to optimize its use of human resources. WG5 itself carries out much of its discussions via email, with an annual meeting, usually during the summer, and occasional other meetings at critical stages in the development of the base language standard. 3.0 FOCUS FOR NEXT WORK PERIOD 3.1 DELIVERABLES Planning for the next revision of the Fortran language are underway. 3.2 STRATEGIES Detailed plans for the next three years are contained in ISO/IEC JTC1/SC22/WG5/N2171. 3.3 RISKS As far as possible, WG5 tries to anticipate technical comments during international ballots by holding informal ballots of its members before any documents are submitted for ballot. Nevertheless, unexpected technical comments can always delay the planned schedule. 3.4 OPPORTUNITIES WG5 has made extensive use of email for over 20 years to speed up technical development. Documents are now distributed by LiveLink. An open web site is used to provide non-technical, and other publicly available, information to interested parties. In addition to speeding up the distribution of documents, the use of electronic distribution and communication systems also provides many other benefits, such as the ability to rapidly carry out informal straw ballots. 3.5 WORK PROGRAM PRIORITIES WG5's priority activity this year is the development of a work plan for the next revision. 4. OTHER ITEMS 4.1 POSSIBLE ACTION REQUESTS AT FORTHCOMING PLENARY None. 4.2 PROJECT MANAGERS ISO/IEC 1539-1: Malcolm Cohen, UK ISO/IEC 1539-2: John Reid, UK TS on Further Interoperability of Fortran with C: Bill Long, USA TS on Additional Parallel Features in Fortran: Bill Long, USA 4.3 ELECTRONIC DOCUMENT DISTRIBUTION PL22.3: https://j3-fortran.org/ WG5: https://wg5-fortran.org/ LiveLink: https://isotc.iso.org/livelink/livelink?func=ll&objId=8919787&objAction=browse&viewType=1 4.4 RECENT MEETINGS 2018/06/11-15 Berkeley, California, USA 2019/08/05-09 Tokyo, Japan 4.5 FUTURE MEETINGS 2020/06 Minneapolis, MN, USA 2021/06 Manchester, UK Note that WG5 normally meets annually, with extra meetings being held as/when necessary to process ballot comments or other high priority activities that do not accord with the regular meeting schedule. WG5's Primary Development Body, INCITS/PL22.3, meets three times each year. Other work is carried out via email.