The Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA) has published a beta of version 3 of its Standards for Operational Vessel Schedules, to gather feedback on how the improvements can better support the automated digital exchange of operational vessel schedules (OVS) between maritime industry stakeholders.
The standards are intended to be implemented by vessel operators, as well as their Vessel Sharing Agreement (VSA) partners and operational service providers, to enable automatic sharing of schedules and exception-related information.
The new beta release contains a proposed coding system carriers can use to create globally consistent references for three key operational identifiers, with the Universal Service, Voyage, and Port Call references aiming to provide a method for carriers to standardise how they refer to services using a common naming convention following a set pattern.
Once the test period with DCSA carrier members is complete, the Association says it will make the Universal Service Reference methodology available for other carriers to adopt. The beta is also open to public review and feedback for a three-month period beginning June 30.
All applicable documents are available via the DCSA website, while a beta API definition is on the SwaggerHub open-source platform, and a reference implementation is available on GitHub.
