Open Standards

"This paper attempts to design a framework for comparison of standards available in public domain and implementation of standards facilities in open source ILSs. The framework is mainly based on recommendations given by ILS-DI and IFLA Working Group on the area under consideration. It takes into account global standards like metadata, interoperability, digital preservation, web access and application programming interface etc. Two open source ILSs (from the matured block of ILSs) namely NewGenLib and Koha are compared against a set of parameters related with standards and drawn from global recommendations.
Keywords: Integrated library system, Standards, Digital Preservation and ILS software"

This report provides a broad overview of open standards that could be used by the D-CENT project in terms of decentralized and federated social networking, with a particular focus on our two use cases of democratic decision-making and social digital currencies.

Current social networking platforms such as Facebook and Google+ are currently built almost entirely on proprietary technologies and cannot interoperate. Due to reasons ranging from data protection to the desire for autonomy by sovereign
bodies such as community organizations and even nation-states, simply using these platforms “as is” is unacceptable to the D-CENT project. However, at the same point the D-CENT project must find a way to communicate with social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook to take advantage of the “network effect” of the tremendous amounts of users on these sites. The ethos of the project is to develop software which is as open as possible. The use of open standards is distinct from the development of open source software. The hypothesis put forward by this report is that the solution is the use of open standards that allow at
least one open-source implementation.

First, we overview an argument for open standards rather than only open-source by learning from the failure of Diaspora, the most well-known alternative to centralized social platforms like Facebook.

Then, we explain the difference between the various standards bodies and their licensing issues. In the rest of the report, we outline the landscape of standards in social networking and go through each part of the landscape in detail, ending with an analysis of socio-economic models for standards-based social networking and conclusions for possible next steps.

In this paper we survey some of the developments with regards to technology-enhanced support of mathematics learning and teaching. Coverage is especially given on how to design systems that work effectively on the Web, particularly in the fields of economics and business studies. This is a rapidly evolving landscape in which general trends in e-learning have raised expectations of the electronic tools

"This paper describes a layered approach to selection and use of open standards which is being developed for digital library development work within the UK. This approach reflects the diversity of the technical environment, the service provider's environment, the user requirements and maturity of standards by separating contextual aspects; technical and non-technical policies; the selection of appropriate solutions and the compliance layer.

To place the layered approach in a working context, case studies are provided of the types of environments in which the standards framework could be implemented, from an established standards-based service, to a new service in the process of selecting and implementing metadata standards. These examples serve to illustrate the need for such frameworks.
"

In this paper we analyse open standards for supporting the reuse of OER in different knowledge domains based on a generic architecture for content federation and higher-order services. Plenty OER are available at different institutions. We face the problem that the mere availability of these resources does not directly lead to their reuse. To increase the accessibility we integrated existing resource repositories to allow educational practitioners to discover appropriate resources. On top of this content federation we build higher order services to allow re-authoring and sharing of resources. Open standards play an important role in this process for developing high-level services for lowering the thresholds for the creation, distribution and reuse of OER in higher education.

Construction works are in periodical need of performance upgrade such as maintenance, repair and rehabilitation (MR&R). Facility managers are responsible to fulfil this need during the whole life cycle of the construction works in a manner that maximises the economical profit, minimises the environmental impact and keeps the risk of failure at a low level. A prerequisite for efficient facility management (FM) is long-term planning of MR&R actions. This requires management of a large amount of information, a process that includes gathering, storing, processing and presentation of data. With the development of open Building Information Models (open BIM) and standardisation of Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) new possibilities of efficient management of FM information have emerged. Due to its parametric and object-oriented approach, the open BIM-concept rationalises the information management and makes it more cost effective. This paper discusses how open BIM, with the aid of IFC, and...

In this paper we analyse open standards for supporting the reuse of OER in different knowledge domains based on a generic architecture for content federation and higher-order services. Plenty OER are available at different institutions. We face the problem that the mere availability of these resources does not directly lead to their reuse. To increase the accessibility we integrated existing resource repositories to allow educational practitioners to discover appropriate resources. On top of this content federation we build higher order ...

In this paper we survey some of the developments with regards to technology-enhanced support of mathematics learning and teaching. Coverage is especially given on how to design systems that work effectively on the Web, particularly in the fields of economics and business studies. This is a rapidly evolving landscape in which general trends in e-learning have raised expectations of the electronic tools to go beyond merely providing mechanical functions: nowadays the teacher expects them to help organise their teaching and even enhance their teaching methods. For the student, there is increasing focus on the learner experience, which seeks a wider range and availability of e-learning support tools together with greater ease of use. Advances in technology mean that options keep changing, setting many challenges for system developers, so this paper seeks to indicate the broad features in these changes, with particular regard to future planning. These general considerations are subsequently brought into focus in later sections of this paper by addressing the question of how e-learning systems may provide judicious support for the uniquely human abilities of solving problems. In this case visualisation is an excellent aid, but any tools provided need to draw on a wide range of online resources that are readily available so as to properly establish the learning context. Finally, we briefly introduce into this context two new systems for teaching mathematics: VisualEconoMath, an integrated environment comprising automated tools for deriving solutions to prescribed mathematical problems and How2SolveIt, which supports the quintessential human learning processes surrounding questions and answers, in this case between students and lecturers.

Interoperability is a major requirement for industries and governments in a society that increasingly moves towards global collaboration and integration. Open standards built on the principles of openness, transparency and consensus lay the grounds for innovation, growth and fair competition. Open standards are not synonymous of open source. The former is a set of specifications, the latter is an implementation. However, they share their commitment to openness and defend the equal opportunities of everyone to participate. This paper looks to the open source as the best way to enable interoperability between different technologies and applications. The role of open standards in interoperability is analyzed and some of the policies introduced by the European Union for the use and dissemination inside Members States are examined. Additionally, the use of open source software combined with open standards is presented and its major social benefits and economic impacts are highlighted.

The mobile internet is already upon us. As advancing information and communication technologies (ICT's) enable the emergence of an information society, the socio-economic demand for mobile broadband connectivity continues to grow. …One technology has the potential to bypass this socio-economic threat. The coverage and reach of space-based communications technology is ubiquitous. Its primary strength lies in its ability to transcend many of the barriers and obstacles of terrestrial infrastructure deployment. Yet, whereas the interoperability of terrestrial infrastructure has allowed the Internet to grow in strength and usage, the growth of costly space-based infrastructure has yet to provide the same potential. ...Nowhere in the space applications sector is the need for interoperability with terrestrial and other space-based infrastructure so critical to its future as it is fixed/mobile two-way Internet communications. The primary conclusion of our literature review was that there is currently no widely adopted open-standard in existence, a fact that impedes the adoption, implementation and growth f space-based infrastructure. A decisive shift towards a philosophy of interoperability and industry standardization may therefore be the key to counteract this trend, as well as to accelerate the rollout of mobile broadband connectivity.

This paper describes a layered approach to selection and use of open standards which is being developed to support development work within the UK higher and further educational communities. This approach reflects the diversity of the technical environment, the service provider's environment, user requirements and maturity of standards by separating contextual aspects; technical and non-technical policies; the selection of appropriate solutions and the compliance layer. To place the layered approach in context, case studies are provided of the types of environments in which the standards framework can be implemented. The paper describes how this contextual approach can be extended to address other areas such as Web accessibility and use of open source software. Use of a common model can provide consistent approaches by funding bodies and shared understanding for developers. This contextual approach is being extended to support development work with other public sector organizations within the UK. We describe how the approach is well-suited to ensure common ways of working across disparate sets of organizations and how the approach can be applied within a wider context.

ABSTRACT Open standardization seems to be very popular among software developers as it makes the standard's adoption by the software engineering community easier and smoother. Formal specification methods, on the other hand, while very promising, are being adopted by protocol engineers very slowly; the industry seems to have little motivation to move into this, almost unknown, territory. In this paper the authors present the i) idea of applying formal methods (formal specification techniques) to open standards' specifications, and ii) an example of a formal specification of open standards, RSS v2.0 in particular. The authors support and provide evidence for the advantages of the open standards formal specification over natural language documentations (the current way that open standards' specifications are released). Formal specifications are more concise and consistent than the ones written in natural languages, while significantly less ambiguous and more complete with respect to the original documentation. Furthermore, they are executable in many cases and highly reusable as most formal methods automated support tools allow for module inheritance. The merging of formal specification methods and open standards allows for i) a more concrete standard design; ii) an improved understanding of the environment under design; iii) an enforced certain level of precision into the specification, and also iv) provides software engineers with extended property checking/verification capabilities, especially if they choose to use any of the algebraic specification languages. The authors showcase how the RSS v2.0 standard can formally be specified using the CafeOBJ formal specification language and demonstrate why the particular formal specification is beneficial.

This paper introduces a model of the information flows in Product Life cycle Management (PLM), serving as the basis for understanding the role of standards in PLM support systems. Support of PLM requires a set of complementary and interoperable standards that cover the full range of aspects of the products’ life cycle. The paper identifies a typology of standards relevant to PLM support that addresses the hierarchy of existing and evolving standards and their usage and identifies a suite of standards supporting the exchange of product, process, operations and supply chain information. A case study illustrating the use of PLM standards in a large organization is presented. The potential role of harmonization among PLM support standards is described and a proposal is made for using open standards and open source models for this important activity.

The importance of open standards in the development of widely accessible and interoperable services in the cultural heritage sector is generally accepted. It might, therefore, be reasonable to assume that use of open standards should be mandatory in the development of networked services. However experience has shown that the use of open standards is not always straightforward and that open standards do not always succeed in gaining acceptance in the market place. This should not, however, mean an abandonment of a commitment to seek to exploit the benefits of open standards. Rather there is a need to be honest about possible limitations and to ensure that there is sufficient flexibility within the approaches taken in development work to accommodate limitations and deficiencies. This paper outlines a contextual model for the selection and use of open standards, which was developed initially to support JISC's development programmes within the UK higher and further education community. The paper provides background to this work and reviews the current status of the implementation of this approach. Finally it conclude by describing how this community-based approach to open standards can benefit from a wider acceptance of the contextual model and a collaborative approach to both using existing resources and support materials and in the maintenance and development of new resources.

Abstract: The rapid development of educational technologies, combined with the Internet boom at a worldwide level, gives rise to favorable conditions for the establishment of e-University as one of the paradigms which are implemented to provide learning materials as well as all ...

The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) defines standards for the geospatial domain. The purpose of open standards is to provide interoperability. However, in our daily practice of creating web applications based on a service oriented architecture we experienced that problems associated with the application of OGC standards do surface. In this paper, a conceptual model on the use of these standards

Open Source Software is receiving an increasing attention in the public administration. The aim of the paper is to discuss the deployment of open source software for office automation and to present a synthesis of the up to date status. It is intended to sensitize provosts and policy makers regarding the value and benefits of open standards in public administration. The article explains why anyone would choose an open standard format for office documents, instead of the obsolete binary formats. The responsibility of the public sector to protect the permanently, open and free access to public documents is emphasized. Switching the IT systems to open source and open standards can solve the problems with significant financial benefits. One available open source software solution in the field, the Open Office suite, is presented as a viable and free alternative to commercial products. The article reviews next the existent competing open standards - OpenDocument and OpenXML. Finally, the...

Open Source Software is receiving an increasing attention in the public administration. The aim of the paper is to discuss the deployment of open source software for office automation and to present a synthesis of the up to date status. It is intended to sensitize provosts and policy makers regarding the value and benefits of open standards in public administration. The article explains why anyone would choose an open standard format for office documents, instead of the obsolete binary formats. The responsibility of the public sector to protect the permanently, open and free access to public documents is emphasized. Switching the IT systems to open source and open standards can solve the problems with significant financial benefits. One available open source software solution in the field, the Open Office suite, is presented as a viable and free alternative to commercial products. The article reviews next the existent competing open standards – OpenDocument and OpenXML. Finally, the...

This paper describes a layered approach to selection and use of open standards which is being developed to support development work within the UK higher and further educational communities. This approach reflects the diversity of the technical environment, the service provider's environment, user requirements and maturity of standards by separating contextual aspects; technical and non-technical policies; the selection of appropriate solutions and the compliance layer. To place the layered approach in context, case studies are provided of the types of environments in which the standards framework can be implemented. The paper describes how this contextual approach can be extended to address other areas such as Web accessibility and use of open source software. Use of a common model can provide consistent approaches by funding bodies and shared understanding for developers. This contextual approach is being extended to support development work with other public sector organizatio...

This paper is a tutorial on recent advances in software technologies that have the potential to make a large impact on the way control systems are implemented. Concepts such as distributed computing, software components, interoperability, open standards, middleware, real-time computing, scheduling and adaptive resource management are defined and described in the context of control systems