Speaker
Description
I began getting seriously interested in the Fortran Standard in the late
1970s because my group used it for the sake of portability and I wanted
improvements. Since then I have worked on a wide variety of features.
My first meeting of WG5 (then known as "Fortran Experts Group") was in
October 1980 and of J3 (then X3J3) in January 1981. I was a member of
J3 from 1983-1991 and its secretary 1987-1990. I was there when it got
into deadlock, solved by WG5 at the 1988 Paris meeting.
After 1991 I switched to WG5, which meets only annually and I was
convener from 2000-2017. I still attended J3 meetings as an alternate
member when there was a special need and now attend only by zoom.
My plan for this talk is to tell you both about the technical issues
that I supported strongly and about the problems over reaching
consensus that I faced in J3 in the 1980s and as convener during my
long role. I hope you will find this interesting and I hope to convince
you of the merits of using a committee to form a standard.
