The following text is taken from the W3C home page at:
http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/
05 March 96:
The W3 Consortium announces Web style sheets
04 March 96:
The W3 Consortium Takes Leadership Role in the Development of HTML
28 Feb 96:
The PICS effort is making headlines. Please see the PICS overview for further
information.
The text of the 4 March press release follows at the end of this message.
Good news?
Brian
The W3 Consortium Takes Leadership
Role in the Development of HTML
For Immediate Release
Contact: Hazel Kochocki
The Weber Group
+1-617-661-7900
CAMBRIDGE, USA -- March 4, 1996 -- The World Wide Web Consortium at MIT's
Laboratory for Computer Science and INRIA has reached agreement with market leaders to
establish interoperability standards for HTML features such as multimedia objects, style sheets,
forms, scripting, tables, high quality printing, and improved access for the visually impaired.
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has brought together experts from companies
including IBM, Microsoft, Netscape Communications Corporation, Novell, Spyglass, and
SoftQuad for joint work on these activities. Recently anounced work includes methods of
embedding active objects within HTML, for which there had previously been many divergent
proposals.
The technical team forming the W3C's HTML editorial review board (HTML-ERB) expects to
define new versions of HTML in the next few months. Specifications, once in a suitably complete
form, will be made available for public review, including by the Internet Engineering Task Force.
Draft documents describing work in progress are available from the Consortium's web site,
http://www.w3.org/
The original HTML specification was written by Tim Berners-Lee, now director of W3C, while
he was at CERN. Innovations from NCSA and other contributors were reviewed under the
auspices of the Internet Engineering Task Force, and published as the HTML 2.0 specification,
RFC 1866, edited by Dan Connolly, now at W3C. Design work on HTML draws from sources
such as the HTML+ and HTML 3.0 drafts by Dave Raggett of Hewlett Packard Laboratories,
and extensions proposed by W3C member companies.
Dr. Raggett, now visiting scientist at W3C, is the lead architect of W3C's HTML activity. He
works closely with member organizations and recognized experts in development, testing, and
refinement of HTML.
W3C specifications incorporate significant breadth and depth of technical expertise and industry
experience. In addition to the open forums from which the Web was born, they draw on W3C
member organizations, which span a wide range of industries, from computer hardware and
software to publishing, banking, and manufacturing.
"The W3C has taken key steps toward the development of future WWW
technology. Netscape is looking forward to continuing to work with the W3C and
its members to create a common vision of the future of the Web." said Jeff Treuhaft,
senior product manager at Netscape.
"We're pleasantly surprised at how well working with W3C has turned out." says
John Ludwig, Vice President of Microsoft's Internet Platform Division.
"Hewlett Packard strongly supports W3C's efforts to improve the quality of printing
from the Web." says Tim Campbell of HP's Business LaserJet Division.
"SoftQuad is excited about continuing its role in the design and development of
HTML. Tim Berners-Lee, Dan Connolly and Dave Raggett have brought together a
very diverse and effective team at W3C and through collaboration with industry
partners." said SoftQuad Product Manager, Murray Malone.
The Consortium has a close working relationship with the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF), a large open international community of network designers, operators, vendors, and
researchers concerned with the evolution of the Internet architecture and the smooth operation of
the Internet. The World Wide Web Consortium will continue to work with the IETF to
standardize accepted practise and to ensure the widest possible review of proposed standards.
The W3C was created to develop common standards for the evolution of the World Wide Web.
It is an industry consortium run by MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science and INRIA.
Services provided by the Consortium include: a repository of information about the World Wide
Web for developers and users; a reference code implementation to embody and promote
standards; and various prototype and sample applications to demonstrate use of new technology.
To date, the Consortium comprises more than 120 organizations.
Now in its third decade, MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) is dedicated to the
invention, development and understanding of information technologies expected to drive
substantial technical and socio-economic change. The LCS has helped information technology
grow from a mere curiosity to 10 percent of the industrial worlds economies by its pioneering
efforts in interactive computing, computer networking, distributed systems and public key
cryptography. LCS members and alumni have started some thirty companies and have pioneered
the Nubus, the X-Window System, the RSA algorithm, the Ethernet and spreadsheets.
INRIA, the National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control is a French
public-sector scientific institute. INRIA is made up of five Research Units located at
Rocquencourt (near Paris), Rennes, Sophia Antipolis, Nancy and Grenoble. The transfer of
research results is one of INRIA's main assignments, in addition to its fundamental and applied
research in information processing, control and scientific computation.
Further information on the World Wide Web Consortium is available via the Web at URL
http://www.w3.org/
For further information, please contact Dave Raggett, [log in to unmask]
Last updated 04 March 1996
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