First ATSC 3.0 Physical Layer Balloting Set To Close May 6, ATSC Says

Balloting on the first component of ATSC 3.0's physical layer is set to close May 6, ATSC said Friday in The Standard, its monthly online newsletter. The first ballot from ATSC’s Technology Group 3 is to elevate the “working draft” of a “system discovering and signaling” document to a “candidate standard,” the newsletter said. This “important part” of the physical layer is called the “bootstrap” or “preamble,” and it provides “robust signaling and synchronization,” it said. Balloting on the document began April 8, ATSC 3.0's framers said at the NAB Show (see 1504130030), If approved, the document would be the first part of ATSC 3.0 that’s elevated to candidate standard status “and represents a major milestone of the process,” it said. “Additional documents describing the physical layer and other layers of the system are expected in the coming months.” Balloting on each of ATSC 3.0's components typically will be a four-week process, it said. As ATSC 3.0's component parts are adopted as standards, they will be numbered after the ATSC specialist groups where they originated, it said. Since the S32 specialist group is responsible for the physical layer, the first document from S32 will be numbered “A/321,” it said.