Control procedures for data communication—an ASA progress report

Abstract

Sectional Committee X.3 of the American Standards Association, has charged one of its task groups, X3.3.4, with the responsibility to “Define and specify functional control requirements and characteristics governing the operation of digital data generating and receiving systems interconnected by communication system.” This effort is primarily directed toward systems employing the American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII). This paper represents a progress report on the work of this group toward a proposal for national and international standardization in the field of control procedures. It describes both the old and new work of the task group. The new work is presented in detail, while the work that has been presented in earlier papers [“Control Procedures for Data Communication,” Task Group document X3.3.4/44, May 1964: “Transparent-Mode Control Procedures for Data Communication,” Task Group document X3.3.4/58, December, 1964: Comm . ACM 8 (Apr. 1965), 203-206; “Control Procedures for Data Communication,” Task Group document X3.3.4/60, March, 1965] is retained here in summary form. Many of the concepts and principles described herein have been submitted to the International Organization for Standardization via earlier papers and are now embodied in working papers of that organization.