]> Memorandum of Understanding among Participating Organizations Text Encoding Initiative
Chicago, Oxford
1988 TEI SO A3

Tagged in TEI Lite on the basis of the original electronic copy.

 translation into P5-based version of TEI Lite. translation into P5-based version of TEI Lite, generation of HTML version initial version of the document, in Waterloo Script Memorandum of Understanding among Participating Organizations Document TEI SO A3

An agreement to define the terms of participation in the cooperative initiative for text encoding.

Purpose

The organizations entering into this agreement (participating organizations) will participate (as described below) in an initiative to draft, publish, and support guidelines for the encoding of texts in machine-readable form for research and teaching and a common interchange format for the exchange of literary and linguistic data.

Basic Principles

The basic principles governing the initiative and the resulting format shall be those enunciated in the closing statement of the conference sponsored by ACH at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, on November 12 and 13, 1987 (appended).

Organization of the Initiative

The initiative shall be guided by a steering committee comprised of two voting representatives from each of three primary sponsoring organizations: the Association for Computers and the Humanities, the Association for Computational Linguistics, and the Association for Literary and Linguistic Computing. The steering committee shall appoint one or more editors to coordinate the actual drafting of the guidelines and interchange format. The steering committee shall also constitute working committees from the literary and linguistic computing community for the actual drafting and development work.

Advisory Board

Each participating organization will name one representative to an advisory board. The advisory board will provide liaison between the steering committee and editor(s) and the membership of the participating organizations, to ensure: that the needs of the membership for encoding literary and linguistic data are adequately addressed in the guidelines and interchange format; that similar or related efforts within specific areas of the literary and linguistic computing community are made aware of and, where appropriate, coordinated with the work within this initiative; and that the membership of participating organizations is made and kept aware of the work of this initiative and provided the opportunity to participate in it.

Commitments of the Participating Organizations

The participating organizations undertake: to appoint one member to the initiative's advisory board. to encourage their members to contribute their technical expertise to the success of the initiative by serving on the drafting committees. to publicize the initiative in their newsletters and other organs of communication. to circulate drafts and partial drafts to their members for comment.

Publication

The names of the participating organizations will be listed in the front matter of the final document describing the guidelines and interchange format, under the heading Advisory Board of Participating Organizations.

Signed:

The Preparation of Text Encoding Guidelines Closing Statement of the Vassar Planning Conference Document Number: TEI PC P1 13 November 1987

Poughkeepsie, New York 13 November 1987 The guidelines are intended to provide a standard format for data interchange in humanities research. The guidelines are also intended to suggest principles for the encoding of texts in the same format. The guidelines should define a recommended syntax for the format, define a metalanguage for the description of text-encoding schemes, describe the new format and representative existing schemes both in that metalanguage and in prose. The guidelines should propose sets of coding conventions suited for various applications. The guidelines should include a minimal set of conventions for encoding new texts in the format. The guidelines are to be drafted by committees on text documentation text representation text interpretation and analysis metalanguage definition and description of existing and proposed schemes, coordinated by a steering committee of representatives of the principal sponsoring organizations. Compatibility with existing standards will be maintained as far as possible. A number of large text archives have agreed in principle to support the guidelines in their function as an interchange format. We encourage funding agencies to support development of tools to facilitate this interchange. Conversion of existing machine-readable texts to the new format involves the translation of their conventions into the syntax of the new format. No requirements will be made for the addition of information not already coded in the texts.
[Version française] Le but des directives est de créer un format standard pour l'échange des données utilisées pour la recherche dans les humanités. Les directives suggéront également des principes pour l'enregistrement des textes destinées à utiliser ce format. Les directives devraient définir une syntaxe recommandé pour exprimer le format, définir un métalangage décrivant les systèmes de codage des textes, décrire par le moyen de ce métalangage, aussi bien qu'en prose, le nouveau système de codage aussi bien qu'un choix représentatif de systèmes déjà en vigueur. Les directives devraient proposer des systèmes de codage utilisables pour un large éventail d'applications. Sera incluse dans les directives l'énonciation d'un système de codage minimum, pour guider l'enregistrement de nouveaux textes conformément au format proposé. Le travail d'élaboration des directives sera confié à quatre comités centrés sur les sujets suivants: la documentation des textes la représentation des textes l'analyse et l'interprétation des textes la définition du métalangage et son utilisation pour décrire le nouveau système aussi bien que ceux qui existent déjà. Ce travail sera coordonné par un comité d'organisation ou`` siègeront des représentants des principales associations qui soutiennent cet effort. Dan la mesure du possible, le nouveau système sera compatible avec les systèmes de codage existants. Des représentants de plusieurs grandes archives de textes en form lisible par machine acceptent en principe d'utiliser les directives en tant que description des formats pour l'échange de leurs données. Nous encourageons les organismes qui fournissent des fonds pour la recherche de soutenir le développement de ce qui est nécessaire pour faciliter cela. En convertissant des textes lisibles par machine déjà existants, on remplacera automatiquement leur codage actuel par ce qui est nécessaire pour les rendre conformes au format nouveau. Nul n'exigera l'ajout d'informations qui ne sont pas déjà représentés dans ces textes. (trad. P. A. Fortier)
Participants in the Conference Affiliations are those held at the time of the planning conference, not those current when this text was put on the Web. -Ed. (1995) Helen Aguera, National Endowment for the Humanities Robert A. Amsler, Bell Communications Research David T. Barnard, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario Lou Burnard, Oxford University Computing Service Roy Byrd, IBM Research Nicoletta Calzolari, Istituto di Linguistica Computazionale C.N.R. David Chesnutt, University of South Carolina Yaacov Choueka, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel Jacques Dendien, Institut National de la Langue Française Paul A. Fortier, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba Thomas Hickey, Consulting Research Scientist, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Susan Hockey, Oxford University Computing Service Nancy M. Ide, Vassar College Stig Johansson, University of Oslo Randall Jones, Brigham Young University Robert Kraft, University of Pennsylvania Ian Lancashire, University of Toronto D. Terence Langendoen, City University of New York Charles (Jack) Meyers, National Endowment for the Humanities Junichi Nakamura, Kyoto University, Japan Wilhelm Ott, Universität Tübingen Eugenio Picchi, Istituto di Linguistica Computazionale C.N.R. Carol Risher, Association of American Publishers, Inc. Jane Rosenberg, National Endowment for the Humanities Jean Schumacher, CETEDOC J. Penny Small, Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae C. M. Sperberg-McQueen, University of Illinois at Chicago Paul Tombeur, Director, CETEDOC Frank Tompa (New OED Project, Waterloo), Bell Communications Research Donald E. Walker, Bell Communications Research Antonio Zampolli, Istituto di Linguistica Computazionale C.N.R.