Automotive Working Group Charter

The mission of the Automotive Working Group is to develop Open Web Platform specifications for application developers, including but not limited to HTML5/JavaScript, enabling Web connectivity through in-vehicle infotainment systems and vehicle data access protocols. The API is agnostic with regard to the connection used.

Join the Automotive Working Group

Start date	8 December 2016
End date	30 April 2018
Chairs	Paul Boyes, Invited Expert Rudolf Streif, Jaguar Land Rover Peter Winzell, Mitsubishi Electric
Team Contacts	Ted Guild (0.2 FTE)
Meeting Schedule	Teleconferences: 1-hour calls will be held bi-monthly. topic-specific calls can/may be held Face-to-face: we will meet during the W3C's annual Technical Plenary week; additional face-to-face meetings may be scheduled by consent of the participants.

Scope

This group will develop service specification protocols and APIs to expose vehicle data and information from an automotive network bus(es) (e.g. MOST (Media Oriented Systems Transport) or CAN (Controller Area Network)) to a Web application. The APIs will expose information such as the vehicle brand, model, year, fuel type, transmission type, steering wheel position, tire pressure, oil level, wiper position, lights, doors, windows and seat settings as well as navigation, trip computer data, climate control data, speed, RPMs, acceleration, gears and other vehicle sensor data.

In order to enable multiple clients and flexible usage, the prime specification for data access will be a service specification, specifying the mechanisms and protocols for accessing vehicle information. The mechanisms will be firstly based on WebSockets and it could be extended to apply advanced protocols in the future. In addition, a higher level API which is intended to use the service will be specified for facility to web developers. Initially these specifications will be limited to passenger vehicles. How an implementation obtains this data is not in the scope of the group.

The specification(s) produced by this Working Group will include security and privacy considerations.

Members of the Working Group should review other working groups' deliverables that are identified as being relevant to the Working Group's mission.

Out of Scope

This Working Group will not define or mandate implementation details including vehicle, network or sensor protocols for sharing data between the vehicle data network and sensors. The vehicle data bus network and protocols are OEM specific and vary from vehicle to vehicle.

However, to facilitate interoperability among vehicle OEMs and encourage adoption of the specifications, the group may informatively reference existing suites of protocols, either directly in the deliverable(s) or in a non-normative companion Note.

Success Criteria

In order to advance to Proposed Recommendation, each specification is expected to have at least two independent implementations of each of feature defined in the specification.

Each specification should contain a section detailing any known security or privacy implications for implementers, Web authors, and end users.

Deliverables

More detailed milestones and updated publication schedules are available on the group publication status page.

Normative Specifications

The Working Group will deliver the following W3C normative specifications:

Vehicle Signal Server Specification

The Vehicle Signal Server Specification defines the semantics of exposing vehicle information through the WebSocket protocol. This specification is dependent upon the Vehicle Signal Specification, as defined by GENIVI.

First Public Working Draft

Expected completion:[Q3 2017]

Vehicle Signal Client Specification

The Vehicle Signal Client Specification specifies a JavaScript API for accessing vehicle data. It is intended to get its data from the Vehicle Signal Server Specification. However, it is also intended to provide a level of abstraction from the service.

Draft state: Use Cases and Requirements

Expected completion: [Q3 2017]

Other Deliverables

Other non-normative documents may be created such as:

Use cases and requirements: The Working Group is strongly encouraging the participants to create and maintain a use cases and requirements document for each specification.
Implementation guidelines: To facilitate interoperability among different vehicle OEMs and encourage adoption of the API, the group may provide informative guidelines for implementors as a separate group Note. This note will includes security and privacy recommendation for the environment surrounding API implementation.
Test suite: A comprehensive test suite for all features of a specification is necessary to ensure the specification's robustness, consistency, and implementability, and to promote interoperability between clients. Therefore, each specification must have a companion test suite, which should be completed before transition to Candidate Recommendation, and which must be completed with an implementation report before transition to Proposed Recommendation. Additional tests may be added to the test suite at any stage of the Recommendation track, and the maintenance of a implementation report is encouraged.

Other non-normative documents may be created for each specification, for example:

Primers
Non-normative schemas for language formats
Non-normative group notes

Timeline

November 2016: FPWD of Vehicle Signal Server Specification
December 2016: FPWD of Vehicle Signal Client Specification
April 2017: CR of Vehicle Signal Server Specification
April 2017: CR of Vehicle Signal Client Specification
July 2017: PR of Vehicle Signal Server Specification
July 2017: PR of Vehicle Signal Client Specification
November 2017: REC of Vehicle Signal Server Specification
December 2017: REC of Vehicle Signal Client Specification

Coordination

For all specifications, this (Working|Interest) Group will seek horizontal review for accessibility, internationalization, performance, privacy, and security with the relevant Working and Interest Groups, and with the TAG. Invitation for review must be issued during each major standards-track document transition, including FPWD and CR, and should be issued when major changes occur in a specification.

Additional technical coordination with the following Groups will be made, per the W3C Process Document:

W3C Groups

Automotive and Web Platform Business Group: This group developed the initial version of the Vehicle Information & Vehicle Data APIs and will likely continue to explore new use cases and other automotive and web related topics.
Device and Sensors Working Group: The Device and Sensors Working Group defines the Network Service Discovery API that addresses some of the use cases that are in scope of the Automotive Working Group.
Geolocation Working Group: The Geolocation Working Group is continuing to work on access to the user's location information via standardized interfaces with mechanisms to obtain the user’s consent as needed. The Working Group's scope now includes the addition of geofencing capability, and the development of use cases and requirements for indoor location enhancements to the Geolocation API.
Privacy Interest Group: The Automotive API Working Group intends to secure reviews on its deliverables from the Privacy Interest Group to ensure they offer the right level of protection to users.
Accessible Platform Architectures Working Group: To ensure the Vehicle Information and Data APIs support accessibility requirements, particularly with regard to interoperability with assistive technologies, and inclusion in the deliverable of guidance for implementing the group’s deliverables in ways that support accessibility requirements. The APAWG will also coordinate review from the Mobile Accessibility Task Force.
Web Platform Working Group: This group defines relevant or potentially relevant specifications including Manifest for Web applications, HTML5 Web Messaging, Service Worker and The Web Socket API.
Web Application Security Working Group: The Web Application Security Working Group is developing security and policy mechanisms to improve the security of Web Applications and enable secure cross-site communication.
Web Security Interest Group: The Automotive API Working Group intends to secure reviews on its deliverables from the Web Security Interest Group to ensure they offer the right level of security.

External Organizations

GENIVI Alliance: The GENIVI Alliance is an automotive initiative that uses Linux and open source technology to define an automotive infotainment system that would adopt the APIs developed in this Working Group.
Automotive Grade Linux (AGL): Automotive Grade Linux is a collaborative open source project developing a common, Linux-based software stack for the connected car and part of The Linux Foundation.
AUTOSAR (AUTomotive Open System ARchitecture): AUTOSAR is an open and standardized automotive software architecture, jointly developed by automobile manufacturers, suppliers and tool developers.
Open Connectivity Foundation/IOTIVITY: The Open Connectivity Foundation (OCF) is an industry group whose stated mission is to develop standards and certification for devices involved in the Internet of Things (IoT) based around Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP)
OMAUTO: The OMAUTO mission is to establish a venue for discussion between telecom and automotive at a technical and industry level to establish any network, any automobile communication

Participation

To be successful, this (Working|Interest) Group is expected to have 6 or more active participants for its duration, including representatives from the key implementors of this specification, and active Editors and Test Leads for each specification. The Chairs, specification Editors, and Test Leads are expected to contribute half of a day per week towards the (Working|Interest) Group. There is no minimum requirement for other Participants.

The group encourages questions, comments and issues on its public mailing lists and document repositories, as described in Communication.

The group also welcomes non-Members to contribute technical submissions for consideration upon their agreement to the terms of the W3C Patent Policy.

Communication

Technical discussions for this Working Group are conducted in public: the meeting minutes from teleconference and face-to-face meetings will be archived for public review, and technical discussions and issue tracking will be conducted in a manner that can be both read and written to by the general public. Working Drafts and Editor's Drafts of specifications will be developed on a public repository, and may permit direct public contribution requests. The meetings themselves are not open to public participation, however.

Information about the group (including details about deliverables, issues, actions, status, participants, and meetings) will be available from the Automotive Working Group home page.

Most Automotive Working Group teleconferences will focus on discussion of particular specifications, and will be conducted on an as-needed basis.

This group primarily conducts its technical work on the public mailing list public-automotive@w3.org (archive) and on GitHub issues. The public is invited to review, discuss and contribute to this work.

The group may use a Member-confidential mailing list for administrative purposes and, at the discretion of the Chairs and members of the group, for member-only discussions in special cases when a participant requests such a discussion.

Decision Policy

This group will seek to make decisions through consensus and due process, per the W3C Process Document (section 3.3). Typically, an editor or other participant makes an initial proposal, which is then refined in discussion with members of the group and other reviewers, and consensus emerges with little formal voting being required.

However, if a decision is necessary for timely progress, but consensus is not achieved after careful consideration of the range of views presented, the Chairs may call for a group vote, and record a decision along with any objections.

To afford asynchronous decisions and organizational deliberation, any resolution (including publication decisions) taken in a face-to-face meeting or teleconference will be considered provisional. A call for consensus (CfC) will be issued for all resolutions (for example, via email and/or web-based survey), with a response period from one week to 10 working days, depending on the chair's evaluation of the group consensus on the issue. If no objections are raised on the mailing list by the end of the response period, the resolution will be considered to have consensus as a resolution of the (Working|Interest) Group.

All decisions made by the group should be considered resolved unless and until new information becomes available, or unless reopened at the discretion of the Chairs or the Director.

This charter is written in accordance with the W3C Process Document (Section 3.4, Votes), and includes no voting procedures beyond what the Process Document requires.

Patent Policy

This Working Group operates under the W3C Patent Policy (5 February 2004 Version). To promote the widest adoption of Web standards, W3C seeks to issue Recommendations that can be implemented, according to this policy, on a Royalty-Free basis. For more information about disclosure obligations for this group, please see the W3C Patent Policy Implementation.

Licensing

This Working Group will use the W3C Document license for all its deliverables.

About this Charter

This charter has been created according to section 5.2 of the Process Document. In the event of a conflict between this document or the provisions of any charter and the W3C Process, the W3C Process shall take precedence.

Charter History

The following table lists details of all changes from the initial charter, per the W3C Process Document (section 5.2.3):

Charter Period	Start Date	End Date	Changes
Initial Charter	3 February 2015	31 December 2016	none
Rechartered	8 December 2016	31 December 2017	Deliverables updated to reflect the current status: adding the Vehicle Signal Server Specification (New) renaming the Vehicle Information Access API to the Vehicle Signal Client Specification (high-level JavaScript API based on the Vehicle Signal Server Specification) removing the Vehicle Data Specification (GENIVI's Vehicle Signal Specification will be referred to instead) updated milestone timeline and coordination with internal/external groups
Extended	December 2017	31 March 2018	Extended to publish VISS as CR and while rechartering discussions took place.
Extended	7 March 2018	30 April 2018	Extend while AC reviews new charter.