On Standards Day at the TAG in Dar es Salaam a paper “Deprecation of Old Versions of the Standard” was discussed.
There was general consensus that there is a need to deprecate old versions and that this is a matter to be decided by the Members’ Assembly. There was, however, no consensus on how much notice needs to be given for such an action to come into effect.
The technical team believes the time is now right to put two questions to the Members’ Assembly:
- Should Version 1 of the standard be deprecated?
- If so, what notice period should be given.
We believe that with this simple guidance from the MA, the TAG could work out the technical details.
The technical team’s view is that it is right to deprecate Version 1 for two main reasons:
- It is difficult for users to compare data between the two integer versions.
- Data quality / validation in Version 2 is more robust than in Version 1
We believe a two-year notice period is sufficient to enact this change.
Discussion on this proposal is welcome.
Implications
- There are 17 active publishers using Version 1 of the standard. This includes a number of large institutions
- There a further 79 publishers using Version 1 who have not updated their data for at least a year. The lists are available here.