- The semi-annual ASTM E57.04 Data Interoperability subcommittee is meeting next week.
- Expectations are running high that we will emerge with a new data exchange format.
- Once adopted by the committee, end users need to demand that the vendor community support it.
Some of you may be aware that as Chair of the ASTM E57.04 Data Interoperability subcommittee, I am a strong proponent of standards. We will be starting our semi-annual, ASTM committee Monday in San Antonio with very high expectations that we are going to leave there with the draft of a new laser scanning data exchange format. This could have a major impact on the laser scanning industry.
The standard has been 3 years in the making. It represents an incredible amount of volunteer effort by a relatively small group of very bright and dedicated people. I want to thank all of them for the time they have invested and I hope the industry will someday do the same, but we are not done yet.
Once approved, the written standard will be published by the ASTM. This is not a simple procedure, but we will follow through on this. In addition to the written standard the subcommittee has also been developing a reference reader/writer implementation of the standard as well as an API. These will be open source and available via a website.
Once we have a standard the attention will then turn to adoption. Since we have had the benefit of a number of key vendors being part of the process, the belief is that this will not be an issue. However, the more demand for the use of the standard, the faster the vendors will make the investment to support it. That is where all of the end users can make their voices heard.
Given the development cycles of most major vendors, it is not too early to begin to generate the demand for the E57.04 data interoperability standard. We need your support.
