The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is an international body that develops standards to ensure compatibility and interoperability of industrial and commercial products. It was founded in 1947 and is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. ISO brings together national standards organizations to develop standards through consensus. An example of an ISO standard is the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model, which defines a framework for network protocol stacks.

1. International Organization for Standardization

José Antonio Rojas Delgado

2012

2. INTRODUCTION
ISO is a shortcut for "International Organization for
Standardization".
This organization is composed by selected noteworthy members
of other national standards organizations. It was founded on
February 23, 1947 and its headquarter is in Geneva, Switzerland.
Its purpose is mainly involved in the development of standards for
industry and commerce for all around the world.
English, French and Russian are its official languages, but the ISO
word, its short-name, is well known universally, because it is also
the Greek word to say "equal".

3. ABOUT STANDARDIZATION
The main purpose of the development of standards, called
Standardization, is the study of a solution for a coordination
problem between manufacturers, in order to guarantee
compatibility and interoperability between products developed by
different companies. For example there are several iso connectors
to allow a radio or CD player be plugged into a car, and a few
adapters, so if you buy a new radio-CD player for your car, you
don´t have to worry about wires, only about the ISO connectors
compatibilty of your car and your new player, and, only if they
don't match, you'll have to buy an ISO adapter, if it is not included
int the player package.
This study can also have the goal of ensuring high safety and high
quality of products.

4. HISTORY TIPS
Performances of standardization we enjoy today are the result of
agreements that manufacturers have dealed with hard work and
lots of years of heavily investigation.
The organization began to be a reality in 1926, under the name of
ISA, International Federation of the National Standardizing
Associations.
Investigations in ISA were paused during the Second World War,
about 1942, but in 1946, when its activities came back again, it
became the ISO organization we know today.

5. MEMBERS
ISO members are widely worthy and recognized authorities on
standards investigations.
There's one member for each country, till involve 162 of the 205
countries in the world.
There are members who participate actively, and others who do it
passively, acting only as observers.
Other members are exclusively informed of investigations results
and agreements reached by the active members. Others have to
pay a small amount of money as a subscription to have right to be
reported.

6. FINANCING
ISO is financed by:
-Entities who manage the result of specific projects.
-Entities who hire its experts to work in a specific technical work.
-Subscriptions of passive members.
-Sales of standards.
-Royalties of publications like technical reports, technical
specifications for products, guides, etc...

7. AN ISO STANDARD
EXAMPLE:
THE OSI PROTOCOL
An example of a Standard ISO publication is the OSI protocol, the
theoretical protocol model comparable to the standard protocol model
by fact, the stack of protocols called TCP/IP, the "universal" language
that must be talked and understood by every computer on the internet.
You can download this text from the below url:
http://standards.iso.org/ittf/PubliclyAvailableStandards/s020269_ISO_IEC_7498-1_1994(E).zip