IVOA Exec Meeting Highlights

Dear IVOA Members;

The IVOA Executive met last week on 17 January 2008 via a teleconference, and in keeping with our prior resolution to improve internal communication within the IVOA, I am once again sending you a brief summary of this Exec meeting.

There were no new standards or revisions of existing standards put forward for acceptance by the Exec at this meeting. Most of the items on the agenda involved status reports or informational bulletins.

Of interest to the Exec were informal reports of activities by several small teams in the areas of TAP, ADQL, and footprint services. Progress is being made in the areas of region specification, query capabilities, and footprint collaborative efforts.

Other Highlights:
- The IVOA Assessment committee continues its development of
  recommendations to the IVOA that come from the response to   the assessment survey. The plan is to have a draft report   ready for review by Exec in April 2008, with a presentation   of the final report at the May Interop

• The Exec was informed of the growing activity relevant to VO interests by Google and Microsoft. Efforts will be made to see if IVOA can contribute to the development of standards in this area and to the formation of collaboration among the principal groups.
• In response to the Assessment committee findings, an IVOA web page that contains information about, and links to, VO informational material, tutorials, and introductory presentations has been established. The page may be found at: http://ivoa.net/twiki/bin/view/TrainingMaterialsAndPresentations
• A draft charter for the Exec standing committee on Standards has been submitted, together with a new document on the Standards process. Francoise Genova has been made the Chair of this committee, and she will be overseeing these documents through the approval process.
• Planning for the May Interop meeting in Trieste is proceeding; as a reminder, the dates for this meeting are 18-23 May 2008. The dates for the fall 2008 Interop meeting are will be announced soon.
• The next Exec meeting will be a telecon in late April 2008

Best wishes,

Dave De Young
IVOA Chair Received on 2008-01-25Z06:16:41