And the short answer is: no. Just before the weekend the OGC announced their mandate for starting a project to:

• To update the publications in line with a number of issues raised in the Change Control Log. Not everything will be addressed - some technical changes are seen as too much
• To remedy the inconsistencies that exist between the content and layout of the publications
• To answer some of the criticisms that have been levelled at the core publications by the training community
• To simplify the Service Strategy publication to ensure that the concepts are readily understood and that the content is accessible to a greater number of users.

And according to the OGC Mandate for Change this "does not include any new concepts to be added or any changes which would invalidate the current use of ITIL."

Personally I think this is good news, although I have some serious doubts whether the project scope boundaries can be kept. This is because ITIL provides a framework that can be interpreted and realized in many different ways. For example the term "system" is inconsistently used across the books, including as a sysnonym for an organization, a way of thinking or a set of technology. Now removing this inconsistency means making a choice for one of the options. But how to make sure that this does not invalidate the current use of the word "system"?

I did an inconsistency review of the ITILv3 core books in January 2007 while they were still being written and already found 74 terms that were inconsistently used across the books. Now a large number of these inconsistencies were already removed before publication, but still some of them remained as you can see from the ChangeLog. My expectation is that this project will require a huge effort in discussing and investigating the inconsistencies as well as a clear and transparent decision making process.

I look forward to see the project details....

Regards,
Jeroen Bronkhorst