After some battles with Austel and Standards Australia in finding out what
was going on, I've been able to obtain a copy of the new version of
Technical Standard 002 "Analogue Interworking and Non-interference
Requirements for Customer Premises Equipment Connected to the Public
Switched Telephone Network", which was determined by Austel on 8 March
1996.

I do *not* know whether it has yet been gazetted. Is the commonwealth
gazette available on-line?

For those interested in the red tape, this document apparently does not
incorporate any input from later than 1 November 1993, the closing date for
public comments of the last draft issued. Apparently, the comments I've
made since then will now be passed on to Austel Working Group 2/1.

Does anyone besides me see a problem in Austel taking from 1 November 1993
until 8 March 1996 to go from final public comments to a determined new
version of a technical standard?

Does anyone besides me see a problem in Austel not providing the means to
determine the current status of any of their technical standards?

Does anyone besides me see a problem in Austel losing public comments and
generally re-shuffling their organisation more often than they are prepared
to publicise the contact people in their organisation?

Does anyone besides me see a problem in Austel not providing the members of
all their working groups with information on the status of technical
standards that may be cross-referenced? In my case, I'm on Austel Working
Group 12/1, End-to-End Network Performance, which has been working on
Austel Technical Standard 027, which references Austel Technical Standard
002. It seems that the working groups have sometimes struggled separately
over definitions used by more than one technical standard, and some
co-ordination would have saved some effort.

[Yes, I've already raised some of these issues with Bob Lions, group
manager, IT Standards at Standards Australia and Rex Christensen at
Austel].

Austel appears to have information billabongs rather than the steady flow
of fresh information... /-:

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