Standards @ Microsoft

Standards and software – combining innovation and interoperability

John A. Phillips – UK National Standards Officer

8th June 2009

Contents

• The challenges and opportunities

• Learning the interoperability lesson from telecoms standardization

• Dealing with innovation in software

• Standards and interoperability at Microsoft

A time of change

• This is a time of change. Today our customers have diverse and complex needs that no single IT company alone can address.

• Increasing globalization, rising Internet use, and higher consumer and businesses expectations are driving increased demand for technology choices and flexibility.

• Technology can present new opportunities and solve new problems. Today, many governments and businesses alike have assembled a diverse mix of applications and technologies from a variety of vendors operating in mixed IT environments.

The challenges and opportunities• Right now we are seeing customers demand solutions to more complex

problems. Technical interoperability is usually achieved but being augmented by new requirements for semantic, organizational and political interoperability requirements.

• Thus the biggest challenge faced today is in constructing system solutions requiring end-to-end interoperability with– Multiple components from multiple vendors– Room for innovation in platforms and applications– Licensed or open-source software– Capacity to cope with rapid development– In-house hosted systems, or in the cloud– Data preserving its meaning over time and across domains– ...

• Interoperability = Choice

Telecoms: the PSTN, standards and interoperability

• Although the ITU itself dates back to 18651, the formal standardization processes are more recent.

• Two consultative committees were created by the ITU’s 1925 Paris conference to deal with the complexities of the international telephone services (known as CCIF, as the French acronym) and long-distance telegraphy (CCIT)2.

• In view of the basic similarity of many of the technical problems faced by the CCIF and CCIT, a decision was taken in 1956 to merge them to become the single International Telegraph and Telephone Consultative Committee (CCITT, in the French acronym) 2.

– 1 http://www.itu.int/net/about/history.aspx– 2 http://www.itu.int/ITU-T/50/docs/ITU-T_50.pdf (p8)

Telecoms: newer telecommunication systems

• As a result of decades of work on standards the telephone network became the world’s biggest multi-domain, multi-vendor machine and very reliable – but it has a very simple service model and so the semantic issues are simple to deal with.

• Newer systems such as GSM, 3G and 4G wireless systems have had to use better standardization and testing regimes to achieve world-wide interoperability and reliability in a much shorter time; and they are tackling the key issue of new and innovative services and their interoperability.

Telecoms: new tools for ensuring interoperability in new systems

• Test suites for conformance• AND test suites for interoperability – they’re not

the same• AND formal methods built in to the standard to

assist with conformance and interoperability testing

• AND feedback to the standard from the interoperability testing

Attacking interoperability in telecoms standards (the ETSI process)

• ETSI’s initiatives to achieve interoperability– Technical Committee Methods for Testing and

Specification (MTS)• Based on ISO/EC 9646• Defining most advanced test frameworks and test

methodologies

– Centre for Testing and Interoperability (CTI)• Efficient and systematic Test Specification Development• Customized Test Services• Specialist Task Forces

– Plugtests service to perform interoperability testing

ETSI interoperability testing

• Plugtests, also known as bake-off (at IETF), plugfests and interop:– Provides feedback to the standardization process– Helps to ensure end users’ satisfaction– Improves both quality and features of

implementations– Accelerates time to market via quick product

debugging

Interop testing session (ETSI)

What about innovation?

• Innovation and interoperability can sometimes sit uncomfortably together but they can be made compatible.

• But there are techniques in standards-writing: – Rules for writing standards to allow innovation without causing

mis-operation– Rules for implementing these techniques (often need to be

understood by implementers if they are not explicitly written as part of the standard)

• Software standards writers can build in a protected corner in their standards for private experiments on innovative services.

Software – the challenge• The software industry is much younger and has yet to grapple with

– More complex systems with more potential for major customer dissatisfaction– More innovative development model– Becoming as critical to enterprises and to society as the telephone networks– More difficulty building the bridge between product planning and standards

• Formal methods are largely absent from standardization and there’s limited interop. Testing

• IETF has successfully used interoperability testing for small systems, but today we have forthcoming semantic, organizational and political problems coming ...– NGN/SOA – a software version of the PSTN– e-Health, e-Government, ...

Software – the first steps

• Need to address interoperability and innovation in an increasingly multi-vendor world and MS is doing this.

• MS bringing maturity to software standards by focussing on interoperability: external standards engagement team; internal product engagement team; under the same organization to connect the two.

Interoperability in Microsoft

Business Groups

Product Plans

Global InputStandards Counseling

Direct BG and Interop Team Engagement

Engagement Plans

Standards Team

Interop V-TeamsGermany, Japan, France,

UK, India, Brussels, LATAM, U.S., Canada, APAC, China,

CEE, WE, MEA

CustomersGovernments

Standards bodies

Execution

Microsoft standards team

• External engagement team– With Standards Development Organizations – to

contribute our expertise and monitor global trends

• Internal engagement team– With products – to build in product cycle

interoperability planning from the very start• Working together under the same leadership

to make the connection

Microsoft is ...

• Committed to weaving interoperability into the fabric of the company, and also through a collaborative approach with different communities, government and standards bodies

• Committed to making software standards mature enough with suitable tools to ensure high-reliability interoperability in an innovative multi-vendor environment

Q&A

Abstract

• The vibrancy and innovation of the software industry is incredible. It has created the modern tools needed by competitive enterprises. But raw innovation in the modern multi-vendor, multi-domain environment can challenge interoperability as implementers interpret standards in different ways.

• The advanced software architect needs to combine innovation and interoperability in complex systems to keep customers happy.

• This session will explore the challenges today’s standardisers in the software domain may face in building a standardizing capability for system-wide interoperability.