[Numeric-interest] IEEE P754 ballot invitation - deadline 28 September

[David Hough 754R work]

Following is the official information on joining the P754 ballot group.

When I went to the link,
 https://development.standards.ieee.org/my-site/open-ballot-invitations
I saw a message "There are no open ballot invitations at this time."
but by clicking on "Show All Open Ballot Invitations" I found the P754
invitation.

It is important to categorize yourself correctly when accepting the 
invitation, as producer/consumer/academic/general etc. as the ballot group
must satisfy certain diversity requirements.

As I stated before,

 I hope that more persons with knowledge of language design and computational
 applications programming will participate as reviewer/balloters.
 Note that participation in an IEEE Sponsor Ballot is a significant commitment,
 not to be undertaken lightly:
 
 * Membership in IEEE Standards Association (IEEE-SA)
 or a participation fee must be paid.
 For IEEE members, IEEE-SA membership is an additional $35/year.
 
 * Sponsor Ballot group members <b>must</b> return ballots.
 The ballot fails if significant numbers
 of ballot group members fail to act.
 
 * Ballots voting NO <b>must</b> be accompanied by lists of changes that would
 convert that NO ballot to a YES.
 
 * It is anticipated that there might be several cycles of balloting,
 response, revision, and resubmittal.

Although anybody may comment on drafts by submitting comments to the chair,
the IEEE protects its copyright by restricting distribution of copies of
the draft to members of the ballot group and to 
other persons submitting comments.     So prior to submitting comments,
persons who are not members of the ballot group must first request a copy
of the current draft from the chair.     Section numbers have changed
since the last publicly available draft a year ago and new material has
been added, so that last publicly available draft is not a suitable basis
for submitting comments.

Official announcement from Bob Davis <bob at scsi.com> follows:


***************************************************************************

Cc: "C/MSC/754_WG Chair" <bob at scsi.com>, "C/MSC Project Staff Liaison" <m.zaman at ieee.org>
Subject: Invitation to Ballot, P754


***** SPONSOR BALLOT INVITATION *****
You have indicated an interest in balloting IEEE Standards documents.

IMPORTANT! To participate, you must have access to myProject through an IEEE Web Account.

If you would like to participate in IEEE Standards Sponsor Ballot
P754 
Title: Standard for Floating-Point Arithmetic
you must enroll as a member of the ballot group by 28-Sep-2007, 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time.

***** IEEE STANDARD DOCUMENT INFORMATION *****
The IEEE Computer Society Society/IEEE Standard for Binary Floating-Point Arithmetic invites you to participate in the Reballot Sponsor Ballot for:
P754
Title: Standard for Floating-Point Arithmetic
Scope: This standard specifies formats and methods for floating-point arithmetic in computer systems: standard and extended functions with single, double, extended, and extendable precision, and recommends formats for data interchange. Exception conditions are defined and standard handling of these conditions is specified.
Purpose: This standard provides a method for computation with floating-point numbers that will yield the same result whether the processing is done in hardware, software or a combination of the two. The results of the computation will be identical, independent of implementation, given the same input data. Errors, and error conditions, in the mathematical processing will be reported in a consistent manner regardless of implementation.

***** MESSAGE FROM THE WORKING GROUP CHAIR *****

Members, and potential members, of the P754 ballot group;

The current draft of the P754 Standard for Floating Point Arithmetic has
changed significantly from the review of comments received and
reorganization into a more logical document.  These changes were
driven by more than 400 comments on the first ballot, 127 comments on
the first recirculation and now over 224 comments on the second
recirculation.

Major changes include:
   1.The moving the normative annexes into the main body of the text.
   2. The addition of a clause on reproducible results for computations
using this standard
   3. The possible addition of extendable precision formats.
   4. The expansion on the treatment of transcendental and other functions

These changes have modified the draft to the point that it is not
feasible to have a clear document showing changes from the original
balloted draft to the current draft; any such document would show mostly
change and hence would be less useful than considering the new
draft as a whole.

This has led to a requirement to re-ballot the draft. Because of the
inability of the myBallot tool to cope with a re-ballot using the existing
ballot panel, a new call for participation must be issued, and a new ballot

group created.  We do hope that the current ballot group will sign on to
the new ballot group.

I am starting this process at this time with a 15 day ballot invitation.

Because of the large changes with respect to language standards,
participation from language experts is requested in the review of this
new draft.

This invitation is going to the existing ballot group and to the 754
mailing list and the MSC mailing list and designated liaison
representatives.

This is also an opportunity for other interested parties to sign up for the
ballot.

Please forward the invitation to any interested parties.

Please join the ballot group by using the myBallot process to sign up.

Bob Davis
P754 BRC Chair
MSC Chair
Sponsor, P754 Standard for Floating Point Arithmetic.
bob at scsi.com



***** ENROLLMENT INSTRUCTIONS *****

Go directly to:

https://development.standards.ieee.org/my-site/open-ballot-invitations

Or, follow this process:

1. Log onto myProject; click the link for myBallot. 
2. Click the link for myBallot Control Panel (if applicable); click the link for "Show/Join Open Ballot Invitations":  https://development.standards.ieee.org/my-site/open-ballot-invitations
3.  Scroll down until you find the open ballot group of interest to you; then scroll over to the right margin and click “join” under the “Actions” column.
4.  Select a classification category and click “OK” at the bottom of the screen.  You will receive an on-screen confirmation that you successfully joined the group.

If you are not an IEEE SA Member, you can either enroll in a single ballot by paying a per-ballot fee or you can join the IEEE SA by choosing an option link below.  Joining the IEEE SA entitles you to participate in as many sponsor ballots as you like for the year.

OPTION 1 - I am already an IEEE Member and I want to add Standards Association Membership. Go to: https://myieeemembership.ieee.org/renewal/RenewalLogin
OPTION 2 - I am not an IEEE Member but would like to enroll in both IEEE and IEEE Standards Association. Go to: https://webapps2.ieee.org/member/Member
OPTION 3 - I am not interested in becoming an IEEE Member, however I would like to enroll as a Standards Association Member only. Go to: http://standards.ieee.org/sa-mem/join.html

============================================
OBLIGATIONS AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF BALLOTERS
============================================
Balloting group members are selected to vote on the acceptability of a new or revised standard, or on the reaffirmation of a published standard submitted by the Sponsor; based on interest in and commitment to reviewing and voting on a specific existing or proposed standard.

Once the document is ready to be balloted, you will receive notification via email.  You will typically have 30 days to review the document and return the ballot with your vote.  By agreeing to participate in this ballot you have an *obligation* to respond.  Failure to return a completed ballot may disqualify you from participating in future ballots.