🚀 go-pugleaf

I talked to the head of the US committee many of whose members participate
on the JPEG and MPEG standards committees.  I didn't realize that these 
standards are being developed by international committees which explains
why they have been slow and not particularly visible.  I learned a lot 
about the state of the draft standards documents that you might 
find interesting.

First, JPEG -- the still image standard.  A draft standard document has been
written and it is being distributed by the X3 Secretariat folks in
Washington DC.  Call Lynn Barra at 202-737-8888 (hit 11 on touchtone phone
to get operator and ask for Lynn).  She can send you a copy of the draft
specification for $8.00.  The person I talked to, Charles Touchtone at IBM
in Tampa, said that they have to go through three ballots, each of which
takes 6 months, so it will be about 18 months before the standard is
official.  However, as many of you probably know, companies are producing
products based on the draft specification today.

Second, MPEG -- the motion video standard.  This committee is much further
behind the JPEG committee.  They are currently working on a draft document,
but nobody outside the committee has seen the current drafts.  Supposedly,
the specification will have three parts: video, audio, and system.  The
system part specifies how video and audio packets are combined.  At present,
a draft exists for the video part, an outline exists for the audio part, and
nothing has been written for the system part.  So, it will be quite a while
before we see a complete specification.  Touchtone said that the video part
was based on a CCITT standard (ptime 64?) rather than the JPEG standard.
This is interesting because the video compression hardware that I'm familiar
with is based on JPEG (e.g., Next video board).

I'm going to try to follow what's happening on these committees, so I'll
keep you informed.
	Larry Rowe