Dear Joe, Thomas, and All,
1) "focus"
in this context the term focus is used to say that this is not the only
investigation carried out by such communities.
2) "will"
the future tense is perhaps motivated by the AALOA community status,
that's just starting. However, as far as I know, OpenURC community is
more or less in the same situation. Note that the URC consortium is
another thing (@ Antonio you know better than me the situation)
3) "rely"
In principle I would say that we will adopt existing standards when it
is possible, otherwise promoting new standards or extending old ones if
needed.
4) "AALOA components"
I fully agree with Thomas. My concern was about the non availability of
such components and the long process that indeed they entail. By reading
the text, it would seem that the roadmap about the architecture of AALOA
components is already fixed (by someone). On the contrary the AALOA is
striving to create an open process, where analysis and comparison of
different solutions is an inspiring tenet.
However if we consider this as a "pre-marketing" action, to create
expectation, then referring to AALOA components could make sense.
Joe I would suggest you to provide an alternative version or rephrasing
of the announcement ( of similar size) .
Francesco
Il 27/09/2010 10.02, Joe Gorman ha scritto:
Dear all,
I have read the proposed statements about URC/AALOA.
I support the idea that the tow organisations should seek to co-operate while at the same
time each having their "own" field of activity.
However, I am a bit concerned that the existing wording is not clear enough. I
found I had to read it several times, and in the end was not quite sure where
the boundaries would be.
Some specific issues:
1. It says "URC will focus on....". URC has existed for a long time, and a
lot of people know it.
When you use the word "will", as future tense, it raises a question
about whether URC is now going to change direction.
Is that the case? I am not sure.
2. Use of the word "focus". I have learned that this word can sometimes be
imprecise. Does it mean "will spend most if its efforts
working on - but still be allowed to do other things" (in the same way that when
you "focus" on something in a photograph, the other
elements are still visible, even if a bit fuzzy) OR does it mean "will work
on this and nothing else"?
I feel unsure which is meant in the context of this message.
3. Both say "it will rely on.... standards". This may just be an issue of the use of
English: "rely" gives the strong impression that URC and AALOA will
have to hope that other people develop then needed standards. Is that
what is meant?
So, even though the parties involved may have a clear idea what they mean, I fear that an
"outsider" reading this will still be unsure of where the boundary is.
JOE
On 27/09/2010 01:07 , "Francesco Furfari"<francesco.furf...@isti.cnr.it> wrote:
Dear All,
I have a question of interest for the temporary governing board of AALOA and
all the promoters.
I will call a vote on that, so I kindly ask all the promoters to read
carefully the content of this message,
and to post here any doubt about this operation. Below you find also my
personal comments
At the AAL Forum, Antonio Kung, Stefano Chessa, me and Jan Alexandersson (
Head AAL Competence Center
DFKI GmbH) had an interesting discussion about a joint announcement to
publish during the MonAMI workshop
at the 5th European Conference on Smart Sensing and Context (14-16 Nov,
Passau, Germany)
You can read the story in the attached message, but for your convenience
below there is the agreed statement
---------------------
(1) As an initiative for the building of an open source accessibility
framework, OpenURC will focus on features for personalised and accessible user
interfaces. This involves discovery of devices and targets, and flexible
deployment and management of adaptors. It will rely on the specification of
standards for device descriptions and user interface descriptions.
(2) As an initiative for the building of an open source service framework,
AALOA will focus on features for ambient awareness, and for the flexible
deployment and management of assisted living services. It will rely on the
specification of standards allowing services to interact with ambient
environments.
(3) Integrating each other contribution
The two initiatives see a potential for sharing developed features and
specification so that OpenURC-based platforms can integrate AALOA components,
and AALOA-based platforms can integrate OpenURC-based components.
(4) Towards convergence
They further agree to undertake a discussion in order to work towards a common
architecture.
-----------------
We decided that the consequent actions of the parties would have been:
* OpenURC to check (1)
* AALOA to check (2)
* All to check (3), (4)
* OpenURC to prepare a specific press release announcing its creation to
the press
* AALOA to prepare a specific press release announcing its creation to the
press
*
* Make a press release for the joint announcement
*
* Make sure that AALOA and OpenURC websites will include the 3 press
releases and link to each other
Thus this mail is to open the discussion about such common action to do and
any further collaboration with OpenURC community.
Here a reference about URC
http://myurc.org/TR/urc-tech-primer
URC stands for Universal Remote Console Standards (ANSI/INCITS 389-2005
through 393-2005).
----- my personal comments
At the moment it may sound strange the wording : "AALOA components" in (3).
In AALOA we don't have any reference to a common architecture yet.
AALOA will grow initially as the aggregation of different projects, and a convergence
process will be "somehow" created in the long run. Nevertheless it is right to
say that the purpose of AALOA is to compare the diverse solutions available, in this
respect URC has to be taken into account and we can encourage its evaluation. However we
may only advertise all the members of such initiative, any adoption or integration of URC
standards in this moment is let to the autonomous decisions of single projects or
individuals of AALOA. As member of universAAL project, I can only anticipate you that
further meetings will follow in the next months between universAAL members and OpenURC
community.
Of course it would advisable that an URC-based project was incubated in
AALOA, it would increase the visibility of URC to all the member joining
AALOA. This is something I already suggested to Jan and that he will further
discuss with URC members .
Said that, aware of the limit of the announcement, I think it is useful to
increase visibility of our actions and to confirm that AALOA is working as
catalyst of interesting initiatives.
Best regards,
Francesco
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