By Ann Bednarz
Network World, 12/24/01

Standards are the network industry's version of a lowest common denominator. Those who set standards help ensure products can work together, safely and securely. Our network coaches, they help shape vendor strategy and teach vendors to play by the rules.

Harald Alvestrand
CHAIR, INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE

A Cisco engineer and a longtime IETF participant, Alvestrand since March has headed the world's most powerful network standard-setting organization. He took over at a busy time, as interest in open, Internet-based protocols for emerging network applications is growing among corporate users. Internationalization is high on the group's agenda; one significant project is to create a way for the Internet's DNS to support languages other than English. A Norwegian, Alvestrand is the first non-American to hold the volunteer post.

Tim Berners-Lee
DIRECTOR, WORLD WIDE WEB CONSORTIUM

Berners-Lee continues to shape the Web he conceived. This year, W3C released the XML Schema specification, which defines how programmers should describe content using XML — in other words, an XML language for defining XML languages, he says. The XML Schema spec, more than two years in development, is expected to ease data exchange among businesses. Still among the projects on the W3C's agenda are XML encryption; digital rights management; and Resource Description Framework, for application interoperability on the Web.

Jeff Schiller
AREA DIRECTOR FOR SECURITY, IETF

Schiller's job is to make sure the standards that make their way through the IETF have adequate security features. If they don't, they'll get no further than him. Schiller says getting developers to pay attention to security is a recurring problem.

"People need to think about security upfront or they wind up making engineering decisions that make adding security difficult," he says.

 Schiller isn't paid for the IETF job, and he didn't look for it. He was asked to volunteer in 1994, so he did, and he's been there ever since. Why? "I know how to do it, and it needs doing," he says.

Scott Valcourt
MANAGING DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE INTEROPERABILITY LAB

Product interoperability is put to the test at UNH's InterOperability Lab. For the industry groups that fund the tests, it's a proving ground. For the students who staff the lab, it's an opportunity to work with real-world technology. For Valcourt, it's a bridge between his two passions, education and technology.  "The mix is the perfect job," he says.

Valcourt predicts the technologies that will find their way into the interoperability lab next year include very-high bit rate DSL, Ethernet in the first mile, high-speed Fibre Channel and 802.11a wireless LANs.