Aware for some time now that it is no longer the only consortium of open systems hardware vendors in town, X/Open Co Ltd has been under pressure to increase the involvement of users and independent software vendors in its standards activities for some time. Last week, X/Open granted associate membership status to its User and Independent Software Vendor Councils, and at the same time added a new Council for System Vendors, which enables smaller systems vendors to participate in the development of both X/Open’s Portability Guide specifications and the Xtra Process for determining future open systems requirements. As a member of one of the councils, an organisation is represented on the main X/Open board, the technical and marketing committees and the technical working groups. The new Systems Vendor Council currently has five members, and is chaired by Ross Summers of Sequent Computer Systems Inc. The Independent Software Vendors Council has 18 members, with Novell Inc the latest firm to join. The User Council now has 23 members.
