The terms Technical Specification and Technical Report are used seemingly interchangably when talking about upcoming C++ features (e.g. here or cppreference.com), however I could not find any meaninful distinction or definition of the terms. What is the difference if there even is one?
2 Answers
Quoting The different types of ISO publications:
International Standards
An International Standard provides rules, guidelines or characteristics for activities or for their results, aimed at achieving the optimum degree of order in a given context. It can take many forms. Apart from product standards, other examples include: test methods, codes of practice, guideline standards and management systems standards.
Technical Specification
A Technical Specification addresses work still under technical development, or where it is believed that there will be a future, but not immediate, possibility of agreement on an International Standard. A Technical Specification is published for immediate use, but it also provides a means to obtain feedback. The aim is that it will eventually be transformed and republished as an International Standard.
Technical Report
A Technical Report contains information of a different kind from that of the previous two publications. It may include data obtained from a survey, for example, or from an informative report, or information of the perceived “state of the art”.
I've found that I overlooked a sentence on cppreference.com about Experimental C++ Features:
Note: until 2012, these publications used the TR (technical report) format. Since 2012 ISO procedure changed to use the TS (technical specification) format.
So while @Bob_ provided information on the definitions, this is what it means for C++ programmers: There is no difference.
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