Open Dialog: Activities of the VoiceXML Forum and W3C

By Gerald M. Karam

(Continued from Part 1)

Meanwhile, the W3C VBWG was progressing its work on the various languages that would be expected to, over time, move through the W3C processes to become W3C Recommendations. It is important to note here that neither the W3C or the VoiceXML Forum are "standards bodies", thus they do not produce "standards," as this term is reserved for organizations such as the ITU, ISO, ANSI and similar national and international standards organizations. Nonetheless people often refer to recommendations or specifications produced by consortium such as the W3C and VoiceXML as "standards" as it is a convenient word to describe the work products.

Finally, the VoiceXML Forum and W3C felt it would be mutually beneficial to have a working relationship with regard to VoiceXML activities. Consequently, in September 2000, the two organizations and their constituents began formal negotiations on a memorandum of understanding that would define the ways in which collaboration would take place. We're hoping to have this memorandum approved in January 2001.

At this time, the language work takes place within the W3C VBWG (http://www.w3.org/Voice/), chaired by Jim Larson of Intel Corp., and in its various subgroups. The specific work developing what is expected to become VoiceXML 2.0 is taking place in the Dialog Language Sub-Working Group chaired by Scott McGlashan of PipeBeach. The development of other markup languages (e.g., for speech grammars and speech synthesis) is handled in other subgroups. The work takes place through email, teleconferences and in face-to-face meetings that occur every couple of months.

The VoiceXML Forum has activities in marketing (chaired by Carl Clouse, Motorola), conformance (chaired by the author), and education (where the author is acting chair). Participation in these committees is limited to VoiceXML Promoter and Sponsor members. If you would like to get involved, please contact the VoiceXML Forum office (membership@voicexml.org). For the full range of VoiceXML Forum activities, please check out the Web site at http://www.voicexml.org.

As you can see, VoiceXML is heating up, and with the wide range of industrial support behind the VoiceXML Forum and the W3C VBWG, the best intellectual and corporate resources are collaborating to make VoiceXML a driving force in the telephony and speech application world.

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