2 The shape of 3GPP, and what the record does not say about it

2.1 Why the shape matters before the procedure does

Every rule in the rest of this course ends with somebody deciding something. If you do not know which body that is, the rule is unreadable.

3GPP's answer is a hierarchy with names, and the names are defined in the document rather than left to custom. Getting them right is the difference between "the group agreed it" and "the plenary approved it", which are two different events with two different consequences.

2.2 The layers, as the document defines them

Three words carry the structure, and all three are in the definitions clause §2:

• TSG — Technical Specification Group. The top technical layer, the body that approves.

• Working Group — an official subgroup of a TSG, reporting to that TSG.

• TSG sub-group — a Working Group, or a subgroup of a Working Group, or a subgroup of a sub-group.

The scope clause explains how work travels down that ladder: a task and a responsibility are given to a Working Group answering directly to the TSG, and in practice the work may then be carried out in a subgroup of that Working Group §1. So the group that writes the words and the group that is accountable for them are often not the same group.

2.3 The permanent staff

Everything else in 3GPP is people who fly in for a week. One body does not: the Support Team, defined in clause 2 under its other name, the Mobile Competence Centre — the permanent secretariat of 3GPP §2.

Its job is set out in one paragraph §3.1: it manages the work of the TSGs, which includes editing every specification once that specification is under change control, preparing and supporting the meetings and their reports, and liaising with outside bodies.

That first item is larger than it sounds. Once a document is under change control, delegates no longer edit it. They write proposals; the Support Team edits §4.6.1. The life of a 3GPP document, from blank page to published version follows the handover in detail.

The same team also carries 3GPP's dealings with the outside world, including registering code points with bodies such as IANA — in the name of an Organizational Partner, because the partnership is not a legal person §3.2.

2.4 Who owns one document

A specification is not owned by a committee in the abstract. Clause 4.2 lists what it has §4.2:

• one prime responsible TSG, always;

• possibly a prime responsible Working Group, and possibly a sub-group below that;

• possibly one or more secondary responsible TSGs or Working Groups, whose objectives are written into the Work Item Description rather than assumed;

• always a rapporteur.

The rapporteur is the one named human being in the arrangement.

Note who that is: an employee of a member company, not a member of staff. The person responsible for the technical quality of a specification has a day job somewhere else. What the role involves before and after change control is in §4.1.2, and the parallel role for a work item is in §6.3.2.

Since Release 20 the document also asks something of everyone appointed to such a role. Delegates acting as rapporteur, moderator or editor are expected to act with impartiality and in the interests of 3GPP, and shall attend a Compliance Training session as soon as possible after appointment and at least once every two years §6.7. A company support letter is not required.

2.5 How the work is supposed to flow between groups

Clause 6.6 sets out a reference model, and is careful to say it is a reference rather than a rule to be enforced §6.6. It describes TSG SA as the illustration, and says the same shape extends to any TSG.

In that model the flow is:

• F1. SA1 produces the stage 1 descriptions — the requirements — and passes them to SA2.

• F2. SA2 defines the architecture, then divides each feature into building blocks based on the architectural decisions it made.

• F3. SA2 forwards the building blocks to the relevant TSGs, which treat each one as one or several work tasks.

• F4. SA2 is kept informed as the detailed work proceeds, and checks that the whole feature is covered without two groups doing the same thing twice.

The same clause says it is the task of TSG SA, SA1 and SA2 to bring SA3 in early, so that security requirements are aligned rather than bolted on, and that SA2 should invite TSGs CT and RAN to judge the impact of a new feature on their horizontal work — conformance testing and device capabilities §6.6.

This is the only place in the working methods where individual working groups are named. Everything else you may have heard about who does what comes from somewhere else.

2.6 What the meeting calendar shows

The calendar on this machine records 4,371 3GPP meetings ^[1], spread over 27 bodies that each keep a meeting series of their own ^[2].

Four bodies hold a plenary series: 3GPP SA, 3GPP RAN, 3GPP CT, and GERAN, whose recorded series stops in 2016. Two more bodies above the technical work also meet: 3GPP PCG and 3GPP OP. A further 94 meetings are recorded under the bare name 3GPP — workshops and gatherings belonging to no single group.

Underneath the plenaries, the working groups with a series of their own:

Under SA	Under RAN	Under CT
3GPP SA 1	3GPP RAN 1	3GPP CT 1
3GPP SA 2	3GPP RAN 2	3GPP CT 3
3GPP SA 3	3GPP RAN 3	3GPP CT 4
3GPP SA 4	3GPP RAN 4	3GPP CT 6
3GPP SA 5	3GPP RAN 5
3GPP SA 6

There is no CT2 and no CT5 in the calendar, and RAN6 appears with 19 meetings between 2016 and 2020. All of them are among the 27 body names the register lists ^[2].

The specification catalogue counts the work a different way, by a short group code stamped on each document. Nine of those codes are in the register here.

Group code	Specifications stamped with it
S5	685 [3]
R4	458 [4]
S3	343 [5]
S2	321 [6]
S4	303 [7]
S1	256 [8]
C1	237 [9]
C4	236 [10]
RP	200 [11]

2.7 Four things this course cannot tell you

Say these out loud rather than guessing, because all four are asked constantly:

• Who the Organizational Partners are. The working methods mention them §3.2, §5.1, and the calendar records that they meet 3GPP OP, but no file here names one. Look in the 3GPP Working Procedures ^[13].

• How a decision is actually carried, and with what weight per member. The voting rules are not in the working methods at all; they are one level up, in the same Working Procedures ^[13].

• When any group was founded. The calendar's earliest entry is where the record starts. CT's first recorded meeting is 2005 and SA's is 1998 3GPP CT, 3GPP SA — CT is not seven years younger.

• How many people are involved, and what membership costs. Nothing read here says anything about delegates, companies or fees.

One more caution about the same calendar: its 4,371 entries hold meetings that are only scheduled as well as meetings that were held, which is why the record runs to 2028 ^[1]. The last date in a series is not "the most recent meeting".

2.8 Where this leads

The bodies are in place. What a Release is, and what freezing one costs describes the container they pack finished work into, and The life of a 3GPP document, from blank page to published version follows one document through their hands from a blank page to a published version.