OASIS OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core (OSLC Core) Technical Committee

With strong demand for better support of integrated system and software processes, enterprises want products from different vendors, open source projects and their own homegrown components to work together. This level of integration, however, can become quite challenging and unmanageable. In order to support integration between a heterogeneous set of products and components from various sources, there is a need for an architecture that is minimalist, loosely coupled, and standardized. The OSLC (Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration) initiative applies World Wide Web and Linked Data principles, such as those defined in the W3C Linked Data Platform (LDP), to create a cohesive set of specifications that can enable products, services and other distributed network resources to interoperate successfully.

OSLC is motivated by domain scenarios such as change management, requirement management, and quality management, as well as by cross-domain scenarios such as Application Lifecycle Management (ALM), Product Lifecycle Management (PLM), and Integrated Service Management (ISM). Each domain and cross-domain area may have its own technical committee or working groups and/or specifications.

The OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC is responsible for specifications that expand W3C LDP concepts, as needed, to enable integration. It defines the essential technical elements of OSLC specifications and offers guidance on common concerns for creating, updating, retrieving, and linking to lifecycle resources based on W3C LDP [1]. The OSLC Core TC builds on community-developed best practices and on the work of other OSLC MS-affiliated TCs. It should develop technical specifications, create best practices documents and formulate design principles that can be leveraged by other OSLC MS-affiliated TCs to enable them to focus on domain-specific concerns.

The OASIS OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC defines the essential technical elements of OSLC specifications and offers guidance on common concerns for creating, updating, retrieving, and linking to lifecycle resources based on W3C LDP. The OASIS OSLC Core TC will accept as input the OSLC MS Steering Committee approved versions of the OSLC Core 3.0 specifications from open-services.net and targeted for development at OASIS as indicated here.

Here are the key responsibilities of the OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC:

1. Expand on LDP concepts, as needed, to meet this list of integration capabilities
   1. Accessing resources
   2. Resource creation
   3. Resource shapes for creation
   4. Resource shapes for validation
   5. Filter/query long collections of resources
   6. Enable web-based delegated user interface dialogs for creating and selecting resources
   7. Leverage web-based user interface components for getting a preview of a resource
   8. Protection of resources through recommendations for identification, authentication, access control, and delegation of access
   9. Consistency in error responses
   10. Common definition and usage of vocabulary terms.
   11. Recommended resource representations
2. Add additional technical elements as required to support current and future scenarios from OSLC User Groups, OSLC MS-affiliated TCs, Subcommittees and the OSLC Member Section Steering Committee
3. Support technical coordination activities:
   1. Review and recommend OSLC MS-affiliated domain specifications
   2. Lead development in, contribute to, review, and endorse best practices and guidance materials for implementers, scenario writers, and specification developers. E.g. vocabularies, test suites, templates, reference implementations, etc.
   3. Develop and prioritize cross-cutting scenarios that affect either OSLC Core TC specifications or OSLC MS-affiliated TC domain specifications.

The OASIS OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC is expected to produce within 24 months of the first meeting:

1. Scenarios: these will guide the priorities and specification contents within the TC
   1. Also a prioritized list of scenarios both developed by the OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC and contributed from OSLC User Groups, OSLC MS-affiliated TCs, Subcommittees and the OSLC MS Steering Committee.
2. Specifications: Based on the scenarios, specifications will be developed to address cross-domain technical requirements, and set rules by which OSLC MS-affiliated domain TC specifications can leverage, and possibly extend the OSLC Core TC specifications. The specifications will provide terminology and rules for defining resource vocabularies in terms of the property names and value-types, and will recommend various resource representations.
   1. These deliverables may constitute a collection of specifications, one per capability or a single specification covering a collection of capabilities
   2. Additional specifications may be introduced over time to satisfy capabilities needed by supported scenarios
3. Supporting and enabling material, produced in collaboration with other OSLC MS-affiliated TCs as appropriate or on an as-needed basis to support broad adoption including:
   1. Guidance — informative, non-normative material covering topics such as implementation, resource design, and specification development
   2. Best Practices — publication of various best (and worst) practices to aid in the implementation of specifications and interoperable solutions.
4. Terminology: a common set of terms intended to be used across OSLC MS-affiliated TCs
5. Vocabulary: in support of specifications, a set of machine and human processable vocabularies, including tools and best practices
6. Test suites: provide description test suites (perhaps manual) to illustrate how implementations of specifications should comply with the specification. OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC may identify suitable a third party automated test suite, such as an open source suite from Eclipse Lyo.

The OASIS OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC plans to revise and expand its specifications over time, to enable functionality called for by revisions in, and expansions of, the motivational scenarios. This means that new specifications that cover new capabilities may be introduced as scenarios are refined on to support new capabilities. In all cases the OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC will produce specifications that are generally applicable and domain neutral.

Maintenance

Once the TC has completed work on a specific deliverable (whether "complete" means it has become an OASIS Standard, or simply a Committee Specification is left to the TC’s discretion), the TC will provide maintenance for that deliverable. The purpose of maintenance is to provide minor revisions to previously adopted deliverables to clarify ambiguities, inconsistencies and obvious errors. Maintenance is not intended to enhance a deliverable or to extend its functionality. In addition to maintenance, the TC may choose to create new versions of specifications that support additional capabilities as needed by scenarios.

This TC will operate under the "RF (Royalty Free) on Limited Terms" IPR mode as defined in the OASIS Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Policy.

The OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC will produce specifications that are applicable to two types of interest groups:

1. Developers of OSLC specifications, including those produced by OSLC MS-affiliated TCs and other standards groups
2. End users of Specifications, including implementers (software vendors, open source projects, and developers of custom business software)

The work should be of interest to anyone involved with integration of tools.

The OSLC Lifecycle Integration Core TC will conduct its business in English. The TC may elect to form subcommittees that produce localized documentation of the TC's work in additional languages.