WG5 Convener's report

Prepared for the BCS Fortran Specialist Group AGM, May 2001

1. Content of Fortran 2000

The main enhancements that will be in Fortran 2000 (the official name has not been chosen but WG5 uses this as a placeholder) are as follows:

Floating point exception handlingTR 15580
Allocatable componentsTR 15581
R1Derived type I/ON1322
R2Asynchronous I/O(see N1189 item #52)
R3Procedure pointers(see N1189 item #43)
R4dControl of I/O roundingT9 in N1323
R4fConstants for opaque typesT9 in N1323
R5Parameterized derived types(see N1189 item #14)
R6aInheritance(see N1189 item #88 and N1272)
R6bPolymorphism(see N1189 item #88 and N1272)
R6cImplicit root type(see N1358)
R6dWITH-like construct(see N1364)
R7aConstructors(see N1355)
R7bDestructors(see N1189 item #89)
R8InternationalizationN1320
R9Interoperability with CN1321

and all these have been incorporated in the latest draft standard, though some polishing is still in progress.

2. WG5 meeting in Oulu, August 2000

We confirmed the content of Fortran 2000 (see above) and constructed Corrigendum 1 to the Fortran 95 standard. We then went in a mode supporting J3's work. We made good progress in constructing first drafts of interpretations for J3 to consider at its next meeting. We did technical work on the items (R6 and R9 in the above list) that most needed it at that time, again for J3 to consider at its next meeting. We reviewed the current draft and suggested many minor changes. It was a productive meeting and J3 appreciated our input.

3. SC22 meeting in Nara, Japan, September 2000

This was my first meeting as WG5 convener and it was an easy one for me since there were no new projects to propose.

WG5 asked me raise the matter of junk mail coming from the SC22 site; this was very sympathetically received and the site manager promised to do something about it.

I also discussed the availability of cheap standards via the internet, following the successful Oulu downloading of the C standard for 18 dollars. SC22 resolved to participate in any trial of making inexpensive standards available.

Most of the discussion involved WG20 - internationalization - and I got landed to chair a breakout session, probably because of not being involved. I did my best in a pretty impossible situation.

4. Publications

It has been a productive year for publications.

Part 3 of the standard (conditional compilation) was reprinted in late 2000 because a line of normative text was omitted.

Revised versions of the two TRs are about to appear. The revisions were needed because of problems found when the ideas were integrated into the draft standard.

Corrigendum 1 is about to appear.

5. WG5 meeting in London, July 30 to August 3 2001

Much work will be needed on the interpretations and to generate Corrigendum 2. We will review the content of the new standard and we will review the current draft. As in Oulu, I see the main role to be supporting J3's work.

6. Timetable

The current timetable is as follows:

J3 delivers to WG5 edits for draft corrigendum 22001-06
J3 delivers to WG5 current working draft2001-06
WG5 constructs corrigendum 22001-08
WG5 provides J3 with review of F2000 working draft2001-08
Corrigendum 2 submitted for processing2001-10
J3 delivers proposed CD to WG52002-06
WG5 approval of CD2002-08
First CD submitted for registration and approval2002-09
First CD ballot initiated2002-10
First CD ballot comments available2003-02
WG5 meeting to resolve comments2003-04
J3 delivers final CD to WG52003-06
WG5 review meeting2003-08
Final CD submitted for approval2003-09
Final CD ballot initiated2003-10
Final CD ballot comments available2004-03
WG5 approval of draft DIS2004-04
DIS registered2004-06
DIS ballot initiated2004-07
DIS ballot results available2004-10
Standard published2004-12

My immediate concern is with corrigendum 2. It will be hard to get this done by August. There are a lot of outstanding interpretations.

John Reid,
JKR Associates,
24 Oxford Road, Benson, Wallingford, Oxon OX10 6LX


Details of current Fortran standardization activities can be found in WG5's own World Wide Web pages.


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