A posting from James Clark to the RELAX NG mailing list announces that ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 34 [Document Description and Processing Languages] has voted to send out the edited text of RELAX NG as an ISO Draft International Standard (DIS). The text prepared by James Clark and Murata-san contains "no technical changes" vis-à-vis the OASIS specification, but has been changed editorially to meet ISO publication requirements. James indicates that the next stage is for the ISO national member bodies to vote on the DIS; if the draft is approved without comment, it may then be sent out for approval as a full-fledged International Standard; otherwise, there may be another round involving a Final DIS (FDIS). ISO/IEC 19757 (Document Schema Definition Languages - DSDL) is planned as a ten-part specification, of which RELAX NG is Part 2. DSDL is "a modular set of specifications for describing the document structures, data types, and data relationships in structured information resources. Two kinds of integrated specifications are included: (1) specifications for describing aspects of validity of a document, and (2) rules for combining and packaging a collection of processes applicable to the task of validating a document. This integration makes DSDL applicable to both business and publishing applications of structured information resources."

Bibliographic information: Document Schema Definition Languages (DSDL) -- Part 2: Grammar-based validation -- RELAX NG. From ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 34/WG 1. Reference: ISO/IEC DIS 19757-2. Date: 2002-05-22. ISO/IEC 19757-2 was prepared by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, Information Technology, Subcommittee SC 34, Document Description and Processing Languages. 40 pages [PDF].

Overview of DSDL. "ISO/IEC 19757 consists of the following parts, under the general title Document Schema Definition Languages (DSDL):

• Part 0: Overview
• Part 1: Interoperability framework
• Part 2: Grammar-based validation -- RELAX NG
• Part 3: Rule-based validation -- Schematron
• Part 4: Selection of validation candidates
• Part 5: Datatypes
• Part 6: Path-based integrity constraints
• Part 7: Character reportoire validation
• Part 8: Declarative document manipulation
• Part 9: Datatype- and namespace-aware DTDs