[CMC] Announcement - CMC meeting in Brussels, June 2007

Mon Apr 23 17:35:36 EDT 2007

Dear CMC colleagues:  As Jean-Marc suggested, we are going to poll the CMC members to determine if we should proceed with the proposed meeting in Brussels, June 25-26, 2007.  Note that Loredana suggested that the meeting should start at noon on the 25th to allow the European attendees to fly in that morning.  We will plan on that starting time, with still the open question as to whether we can extend to noon on the 27th, in order to meet two full days (that depends on room availability).  

In order to comply with some of the concerns expressed, we will consider that this is not a full, formal meeting.  Rather it should be considered a workshop (or a one-time "BOF" or "SIG") of CMC members that are available to help make progress on the issues that have arisen lately.  

The meaning of a positive vote is that you agree that the available members should meet to make as much progress as possible on the "special topics" on the agenda, even in the absence of the members that cannot attend.   

The meaning of a negative vote is that you believe the available members should not meet in the absence of the members who cannot attend.  

The projected attendance as it stands right now is:   

ASI - yes (preferred IOAG site)
BNSC - maybe
CSA - maybe
CNES - yes (preferred IOAG site)
DLR - no 

ESA - yes
FSA - yes
INPE - no
JAXA - yes
NASA - yes

With six of the ten agencies represented, we have a quorum.  However, our intention is not to conduct any major policy votes at the meeting, but rather to provide inputs on the activities since the last meeting (such as new proposals for business practices) and get feedback from the attendees, and also to plan work for responding to incoming activities (like IOAG actions).  

Note that the CCSDS procedures manual:

http://public.ccsds.org/publications/archive/A00x0y9.pdf <http://public.ccsds.org/publications/archive/A00x0y9.pdf> 

establishes "broad rules" for meetings, but allows that the CMC may deviate from them if it so chooses.  In this case, we propose to deviate from these broad rules thusly:  

(1)   All heads of delegations will not attend.  

(2)   We did not publish this meeting location two years in advance.  

(3)   A revised agenda may be published one month in advance of the meeting, but it may not be the final agenda (workshop preparation will progress later in the schedule).  

There is plenty of reading material in the email threads below to provide an enjoyable romp through the pros and cons of this proposed meeting.   I encourage you to vote on the basis of whether the potential progress of the meeting warrants the cost to the attendees (both in currency and in personal investment).  

Thanks very much,

   -=- Mike

Mike Kearney

NASA MSFC EO-01

256-544-2029

-----Original Message-----
From: cmc-bounces at mailman.ccsds.org [mailto:cmc-bounces at mailman.ccsds.org] On Behalf Of Adrian J. Hooke
Sent: Monday, April 23, 2007 2:21 PM
To: Soula Jean-Marc
Cc: CCSDS Management Council
Subject: RE : [CMC] Announcement - CMC meeting in Brussels, June 2007

Jean-Marc: I understand your concerns, but as CESG Chair could I please 

offer a counter-opinion?

1. This is a time of considerable change and as you know there are several 

"hot technical items" under discussion (SM&C, SOIS, Cislunar, 

IP-over-CCSDS, Cross Support Architecture, etc). It seems to many of us 

that there is great value in having the CMC discuss these issues "mid-way" 

between meetings, so that any redirections in CCSDS work can be made in 

time to steer the Fall meeting.

2. The IOAG meets in Spain from 18-20 June. IOAG-11 has a very rich agenda 

that addresses many areas of intimate interest to CCSDS:

Status CCSDS Work in Response to IOAG Resolutions     A. Hooke / N. Peccia

Space Communications Architecture Issues        All Agencies

-- Feed-back on S-band Frequency Utilization          D. Struba

-- Modulation Scheme                            W. Hell

-- Coding Standards                             W. Hell

-- Internet Protocol in Space                   N. Peccia

Space Communications Architecture at NASA             J. Rush

Space Communications Architecture (ESA vision)        P. Maldari

Status of Interoperability Standards/Implementation   All Agencies

Status of SLE Service Management Operation Demo JAXA

Status of Cross Support Service Architecture:         JAXA

NASA Service Architecture                       J. Rush

Status Lunar/Mars Exploration                   All Agencies

3. The OMG meets in Brussels from 25-29 June. On Thursday 28 June there is 

a "Space Task Force Seminar" where several of the CCSDS principals have 

been invited to speak:

http://www.omg.org/news/meetings/tc/agendas/info-brussels/Space_Seminar_Agenda.pdf

4. A potential "target of opportunity" therefore presented itself for a 

mid-term meeting of the CMC (a) to debrief from the IOAG meeting and (b) to 

discuss the way forward on the "hot technical items". In return for CCSDS 

participation in the Space Task Force Seminar, the OMG agreed to give us a 

room (at no cost to us) for two days - Monday and Tuesday, 25-26 June. 

There are no other OMG strings attached - essentially the CMC will be left 

alone to meet, and the OMG will host the meeting.

5. Given the close proximity of Brussels to 60% of the CMC members and 

considering the excellent timing of the meeting with respect to the IOAG, 

this seems like a very attractive opportunity for an ad-hoc CMC meeting.

Best regards

Adrian

   -=- Mike

Mike Kearney

NASA MSFC EO-01

256-544-2029

From: Soula Jean-Marc [mailto:jean-marc.soula at cnes.fr] 
Sent: Friday, April 20, 2007 8:45 AM
To: Kearney, Mike W. (MSFC-EO01); CCSDS Management Council
Cc: CCSDS Secretariat
Subject: RE : [CMC] Announcement - CMC meeting in Brussels, June 2007

Mike,

I am not in full agreement with your arguments and I offer the following views and comments for some more discussions on your proposal for an additional CMC in 2007 :

- just to start, the week you proposed is a problem for me as I'll be in Moscow (RCSGSO) and Madrid (IOAG) on the two previous weeks and I can hardly afford a third week in row out of office

- I understand there may be an opportunity for the few CMC members who will attend the OMG meeting but I'm still with the impression that the majority of the CMC members had no plan to go to Brussels and for them, your suggestion means an extra trip

- the opportunity of meetings with OMG that you advertise contradicts with the reports we got and the resolutions we made in the last two CMC's, in particular those related to the findings that the overlap with OMG was limited to one WG in one area and there was no interest to continue joint plenary meetings with them, and a liaison was sufficient to monitor each other actrivities ; which novelties justify that we revive at a full CMC level this linkage that turned out to be limited in efficiency during the joint meetings in 2005 and from then ? SDTF was invited in Cold Springs and didn't show up.

- to the contrary, I have no objection that NASA and above all ESA (I hope Nestor and/or Mario will be there as SM&C is our only interactive WG with OMG) meet with the OMG management and then report to the CMC.

- the scheduling of the CMC meetings must keep the objective to have all agencies attending ; that's why we spend such a long time at each of our meetings to plan for the next ones ; there is little room for rescheduled meetings that could leave several members aside. This could be even more complex in the future if new members join...

- the two meetings per year are not  a min or a max, they are just a CCSDS documented rule and the result of an agreement between the members aiming at guarantying a maximum participation of all and a proper budget planning by each.

- the 9 months period between meetings is not a real problem to me : the CMC is not a stand alone organization whose activities justify a particular rate for our meetings ; in fact, our meeting rate is dependent on the rate of the WG meetings and we decided that this time we give them a nine month interval. After Martin's comments, I guess I do not need to develop that all WGs in the CCSDS work web site tools and the CMC is supposed to do the same, including the use of e-polls for major in-betwen-meetings decisions...

- I have the idea that the CMC is fed with information coming from the Areas and the CESG and that, therefore, the CMC meetings should come after the WG meetings ; even more, I appreciate the Area reports and the face to face meeting with the ADs that provides an instructive feeling of what is going on in and across the areas ; this we would certainly miss in Brussels and moreover, we therefore cannot cancel the F07 meeting in Darmstadt.

- concerning the agenda you propose, it doesn't look like a standard CMC agenda (missing many items of interest as CESG, Agencies or secretariat reports, etc...) and I'm not sure that everything is in place to meet your critical mass expectations ; for instance, the outcomes of the IOAG meeting that are of interest for the CMC are very dependent on the questions passed by the CMC to the IOAG ; so far, I'm not aware of any such question, in spite of actions and resolutions at our last meeting (Cislunar, HRU, CMLP...). What does the CMC expect from the IOAG meeting that cannot be handled thru a reporting by the liaison followed by e-polls if required ? Do you really expect that IOAG will make real time decisions in Cebreros if those were not triggered long before by specific questions ?

- for some other agenda items, it is not clear to me what justifies a face to face meeting instead of an e-poll and some insight into the situation would be more than welcome : this applies to SOIS and SM&C, but also to new members (do you have candidates and will they attend in Brussels ?). On the improvement of our processes, I have not seen much reactions to Craig's proposals but maybe he got enough to produce and submit a new update for comments.

That's probably enough to explain my reluctancies ...

My recommendation today would be that the decision of an additional CMC is submitted to a formal e-poll on the subject so that we have a complete and final view on the attendance and on the agenda ; it would also allow to identify if this may be considered a CMC meeting or just a sub-group opportunity meeting.

Best regards

Jean-Marc Soula 
CNES - DCT/OP/C-STA 
Advisor, GN Operations 
18 Avenue Edouard Belin 
31401 Toulouse Cedex 9 - France 
Tel.: +33 (0)5 61 2 74647 
Fax.: +33 (0)5 61 2 73135 
Email: Jean-Marc.Soula at cnes.fr 

-----Message d'origine-----
De : cmc-bounces at mailman.ccsds.org [mailto:cmc-bounces at mailman.ccsds.org] De la part de Kearney, Mike W. (MSFC-EO01)
Envoyé : mercredi 11 avril 2007 15:48
À : CCSDS Management Council
Cc : CCSDS Secretariat
Objet : [CMC] Announcement - CMC meeting in Brussels, June 2007

After further discussion within the Secretariat, we feel that we have enough "critical mass" to make progress on the critical issues on the agenda.  

We are formally announcing the plan for the CMC meeting, June 25-26, in Brussels, Belgium, in accordance with the attached agenda.  

We hope that as many agencies as possible can support this meeting.  

Thanks very much,

   -=- Mike

Mike Kearney

NASA MSFC EO-01

256-544-2029

From: secretariat-bounces at mailman.ccsds.org [mailto:secretariat-bounces at mailman.ccsds.org] On Behalf Of Kearney, Mike W. (MSFC-EO01)
Sent: Wednesday, April 11, 2007 7:25 AM
To: CCSDS Management Council
Cc: CCSDS Secretariat
Subject: [Secretariat] Discussion - The need for the CMC meeting

Dear CMC members,  

Several days ago we proposed to have a CMC meeting in Brussels, after the IOAG meeting in Spain, and during the OMG meeting in Brussels.  As of right now, we have had the following responses:   

ASI - yes (preferred IOAG site)
BNSC - maybe
CSA - no response yet
CNES - yes (preferred IOAG site)
DLR - no 

ESA - yes
FSA - yes
INPE - no
JAXA - yes
NASA - yes

In particular, DLR/Martin Pilgram proposed that we didn't need a meeting at this time, it would be better to add a day to the meeting in October.  I was holding back on this message until I saw the ESA response, but perhaps I should have sent it earlier.  In any case, I offer more detailed reasons below to have this meeting now, and why it is good to have it in conjunction with the OMG.  

Aside from the reasons below, my own personal feeling is that the general guideline of meeting twice a year should be a minimum, not a maximum.  In the case now, the delay from January to October is 9 months.  My personal feeling was that if an organization can "rest" for 9 months, then it can probably rest even longer, and start planning retirement.  In our case, I don't feel like we can rest.  I brought this up with Adrian, and as we enumerated all the critical topics that we had ongoing right now,  it became apparent that the topics justified the meeting. 

To get the earlier possible notice to the CMC members, we sent that first note before we developed the detailed planned agenda.  We just finished it, so I have attached it to this note.  Also, at the bottom of the agenda, you will see the OMG activities which the CMC members can participate in.  It's my understanding that we can attend these meetings without paying the OMG registration fee.  

To answer some of the other questions that have arisen:  

Three of the CMC attendees will be at the IOAG meeting (Loredana, Martin and Jon-Marc) and two of them suggested that we could have it in Spain with the IOAG meeting.  However, that approach has a number of logistics problems:  

·         We can't meet in parallel with the IOAG because of the needed attendance of others.  

·         The only free day on IOAG week is Friday, June 22, and there are more materials than a 1-day meeting.  And others (not at IOAG) don't want to travel internationally for a 1-day meeting.  

·         We can't meet in Spain the week after the IOAG because it will not allow others (Hooke, Kearney) to attend the OMG meeting on Wednesday (because of the Wednesday travel that would be required).  And IOAG attendees probably would not want to spend the weekend between meetings.  

·         The OMG is offering free meeting space for the CMC, and if the same were possible at the Spain location (uncertain) it would take awhile to negotiate it.  

·         We need a little time after the IOAG to prepare material for the CMC.  

Also, some points on the benefit of collocating with the OMG:  

·         Meeting with the OMG is a great opportunity to "get back in diplomatic relations" at the management level with the OMG since we don't have any joint technical meetings planned. Strategically important to make it clear that we are watching them and want to cooperate, not compete.

·         The OMG is extending an effort that is very duplicative of CCSDS Spacecraft Monitor and Control (in MOIMS) and we need to get their attention on avoiding duplication of our existing efforts.   

·         There is an unusually pertinent opportunity for CMC members to participate in these activities immediately after the CMC meeting:   

o    27 June (PM):  Space Domain Task Force

o    28 June:       Space Task Force Seminar (including M. Kaufeler's presentation):

o   http://www.omg.org/news/meetings/tc/agendas/info-brussels/Space_Seminar_Agenda.pdf

And a few other points on why we need this CMC meeting:  

·         Note the attached agenda is a very full two days.  

·         (From Adrian) I fully expect that NASA's proposal to work the Service Architecture will be referred back to CCSDS to do the work, so we need the CMC to act rapidly to re-charter the WG and get moving towards the October meeting.

·         We have a very urgent need for a mid-term review on tough issues like SOIS, SMC and IP to steer October technical work.

·         We need CMC input on the Secretariat's efforts to improve the business  processes (charters, RIDs, etc.)

So hopefully I've convinced you of the need to support this meeting.  

   -=- Mike

Mike Kearney

NASA MSFC EO-01

256-544-2029

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