December 2000

• [December 29, 2000] "Scientific Data Integration: Wrapping Textual Documents with a Database View Mechanism and an XML Engine." By Zoé Lacroix. Presented at the IEEE International Symposium on Bio-Informatics and Biomedical Engineering (BIBE 2000), Washington DC, November 2000. Published in Proceedings of the IEEE International Symposium on Bio-Informatics and Biomedical Engineering [Los Alamitos, CA: IEEE Computer Society, 2000] pages 71-76 (with 32 references). "Building a digital library for scientific data requires accessing and manipulating data extracted from flat files or from documents retrieved from the World Wide Web. We present an approach to querying flat files as well as Web data sources through an object database view based on a database system and a wrapper. Generally, a wrapper has two tasks: it first sends a query to the source to retrieve data and, secondly builds the expected output with respect to the virtual structure. Scientific data servers, and in particular the ones publicly available on the Web, usually provide information retrieval techniques to access data. Our wrappers are composed of a retrieval component, based on an intermediate object view mechanism called 'search views' mapping the source capabilities to attributes, and a XML engine to perform these two tasks. If the retrieval component is specific to each data source, this approach shows that the extraction component (the XML engine) can be common. We describe our system and focus on the retrieval component of the Object-Web Wrapper (OWW) for Web sources. The originality of our approach consists of (1) a common wrapper architecture for flat files and Web data sources sharing a XML engine for data extraction, (2) a generic view mechanism to access data sources with limited capabilities, and (3) the representation of hyperlinks as abstract attributes in the object view as well as their use in the search view. Our approach has been developed and demonstrated as part of a multidatabase system supporting queries via uniform Object Protocol Model (OPM) interfaces..." [cache]

• [December 29, 2000] StarOffice XML File Format. Technical Reference Manual. Draft 9, December 2000. 393 pages. "This manual describes the StarOffice XML file format. XML is the new native file format for the StarOffice suite, replacing the old binary file format. Our goal is twofold: to have a complete specification encompassing all StarOffice components, and to provide an open standard for office documents. In our opinion, XML is ideal as an open standard because of the free availability of XML specifications and document type declarations (DTDs), and the XML support for XSL, XSLT, XLink, SVG, MathML, and many other important and emerging standards. One single XML format applies to different types of documents, for example, the same definition applies to tables in text documents and tables in spreadsheets. This working draft manual contains the current specification of the StarOffice XML file format. As the term 'working draft' implies, the StarOffice XML file format is work in progress. This fact has the following implications for this manual: (1) The specification contained in this working draft is not complete. The XML specification for many of the StarOffice features has not yet been decided or documented. (2) This working draft may contain specifications that are not currently implemented in the StarOffice XML import and export filters. This draft should also not omit specifications for any features that are already implemented in the StarOffice XML filters but there may be exceptions to this. (3) The specifications described in this working draft may change. This is especially true for specifications that are not currently implemented in the StarOffice XML filters, but may also be the case for specifications that are already implemented. The reasons for changing the specifications include changes to related working drafts like XSL-FO or SVG, suggestions from reviewers of the manual, errors or inconsistencies that are found, or problems with new specifications that can only be resolved by changing existing specifications. (4) This working draft may contain errors, missing information, or incomplete specifications. The StarOffice XML project "contains the support for the XML based file format. (1) The module sax contains an XML parser and an XML writer component, both based on the SAX interface. (2) The module xmloff contains the document type definitions (DTDs) for the XML based file format. It also contains most of the C++ code to read and write these files through the SAX interface. Some additional code exists within the application modules. (3) The module package contains the Zip file access API implementation + the 'generic' package API implementation. It will also contain the code to support the XML Manifest file." See also the XML DTD modules in the CVS repository. Update notice from Daniel Vogelheim 2000-12-29. See references in "StarOffice XML File Format." [cache]

• [December 29, 2000] "The Integration of Information Retrieval Techniques Within a Software Reuse Environment." By Forbes Gibb, Colm McCartan, Ruairi O'Donnell, Niall Sweeney, and Ruben Leon (Department of Information Science, Strathclyde University, 26 Richmond St., Glasgow, G1 1XH, UK). In Journal of Information Science [ISSN: 0165-5515] Volume 26 Number 4 (2000), pages 211-226. With 46 references. "This paper describes the development of an information retrieval (IR) model for the indexing, storage and retrieval of documents created in extensible mark-up language (XML). The application area is the software reuse environment, which involves a broader class of documents than can be processed by conventional IR systems. This includes design and analysis documents in unified modelling language (UML) notation, as well as textual format, source code and textual and source code component interface definitions. XML was selected because it is emerging as the key standard for the representation of structured documents on the World Wide Web (WWW) and incorporated methods for the representation of metadata. A model is described that is easily customisable, since it is based upon an extensible object-oriented framework. This allows the development of an IR architecture that can easily be adapted to cope with the proliferation of XML document type definitions (DTSs) that is likely to be a characteristic of the WWW in the near future... FIRE is a robust model for IR applications and as such can be regarded as at least comparable with other models for a general IR system. Since this design has never been fully implemented, it is of interest to the authors to test and evaluate FIRE as part of its utilisation within the project. However, our reasons for selecting FIRE were also closely related to the requirements of the AUTOSOFT project and the other development strategies selected in the project. One of the requirements of the AUTOSOFT project is to develop a set of distributed, collaborating components. This component approach applies at the macro level of the project development and to individual parts of the indexing and retrieval engines. Specifically, the indexing engine needs to allow different algorithms to be used to construct entries in the textual document index. This corresponds, for the most part, to allowing different word stemmers to be written and slotted in to the system without too much effort. By this we mean that the rest of the system must remain unaffected by the change and should not need recompilation. A component approach fulfils this design criterion and the FIRE framework is ideally suited to this for two reasons. Firstly, being object oriented it allows interfaces between each part to be rigidly defined so that new parts can be added without fear of affecting the functioning of other parts as long as that new part conforms to the interface of the part it replaces. Of course, this can be true of all systems developed with OO technology. Secondly, FIRE forms links between functional parts by means of the indexing and retrieval modalities. These effectively create soft links between the parts of the FIRE framework concerned with: representing the document contents; storing those contents in an index; the method for transforming the contents to the form that is to be indexed; and the matching to be used to retrieve the document. By soft links, we mean that at application construction the exact method for indexing any given document feature or retrieving one of its features need not be defined. Depending on the programming method used, these soft links can just be functional or can extend to the run-time environment where the application is unaware of what parts (classes) it requires until they are specified with an indexing or retrieval modality. It is these soft links that allows a key requirement of AUTOSOFT to be fulfilled, namely allowing the behaviour of the feature indexing and matching to be changed after the system has been constructed without reference to any existing indexing or matching functionality in the system. Another requirement is created by the choice of XML as our document representation language. Because of this, a model is preferred that ties closely with the document structure of XML for ease of development and for a consistent modelling approach to be taken in the IR system. In examining FIRE one can see how XML elements and FIRE document features play a very similar role in the overall document structure. By allowing a user to specify the mapping between the XML entities and FIRE document features the system can index any XML document providing a FIRE document feature exists that can represent the information contained by that XML entity... avenues for future work include the development of a web-browser based interface to the retrieval engine and expansion of the functionality to incorporate different XML DTDs. As noted above the design of the system will allow most XML DTDs to be incorporated with out any programmatic changes to the system. Currently it is envisaged that the configuration of the system can be set using an XML file that describes the mapping between XML elements, documents features and indexing features." [cache]

• [December 28, 2000] "The Dublin Core Metadata Initiative: Mission, Current Activities, and Future Directions." By Stuart L. Weibel (OCLC Office of Research) and Traugott Koch (NETLAB).. In D-Lib Magazine [ISSN: 1082-9873] Volume 6 Number 12 (December 2000). With 54 references. "Metadata is a keystone component for a broad spectrum of applications that are emerging on the Web to help stitch together content and services and make them more visible to users. The Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) has led the development of structured metadata to support resource discovery. This international community has, over a period of 6 years and 8 workshops, brought forth: (1) A core standard that enhances cross-disciplinary discovery and has been translated into 25 languages to date; (2) A conceptual framework that supports the modular development of auxiliary metadata components; (3) An open consensus building process that has brought to fruition Australian, European and North American standards with promise as a global standard for resource discovery; (4) An open community of hundreds of practitioners and theorists who have found a common ground of principles, procedures, core semantics, and a framework to support interoperable metadata. The 8th Dublin Core Metadata Workshop capped an active year of progress that included standardization of the 15-element core foundation and approval of an initial array of Dublin Core Qualifiers... The DCMI Open Metadata Registry is a prototype for the DCMI registry, and was demonstrated at DC-8 by Eric Miller. This registry is built from the EOR Extensible Open RDF Toolkit, an open source toolkit designed to facilitate the design and implementation of applications based on the W3C's RDF and XML standards. EOR is also being used by the European Commission funded SCHEMAS project. DCMI or an initiative like the SCHEMAS project can use this Extensible Open RDF (EOR) Toolkit to build a registry that reflects policy and implementation decisions about a given application. The software will allow schema designers to discover, navigate and annotate semantics and to understand relationships to other semantics. The prototype supports the construction and management of a database for aggregation, querying, managing and displaying metadata in RDF format. User interfaces for human and machine usage and an improved annotation support are still under development. This software is also a cornerstone of the open source approach to software development in the DCMI, and is available for development (both for commercial and research adaptation) under a liberal open source license. It is hoped that this approach will promote significant community development that will be fed back into the software base for the benefit of all interested parties... The year 2000 marked the beginning of a transition in Dublin Core Metadata Initiative activities. The approval of DC qualifiers provides a finer granularity for resource description, and the work of the DCMI Education working group extends the scope of DCMI semantics to embrace domain specific needs. The emerging work on application profiles suggests the means to further expand into the uncharted territory of mixing namespaces and hybrid schemas that borrow elements from different communities. The DCMI workplan for the year 2001 will embrace a variety of ongoing activities, and some new ones, as well..." See: "Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI)."

• [December 28, 2000] "Research Standards Buy- and Sell-Side Firms Come Together Around RIXML." By Anthony Guerra. In WebTech Wall Steet and Technology (WST) (December 14, 2000). "Representatives from buy- and sell-side firms have formed RIXML.org (research information exchange markup language) in order to establish that protocol-in-the-making as the standard for describing all types of financial research and analysis. By agreeing on one protocol to describe such information, which comes in many different forms including Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents and audio and video files, financial institutions are trying to create stores of research data described by a uniform protocol. Once that is achieved, research from all sources -- whether internal or from various financial institutions -- can be aggregated, co-mingled, filtered and searched. 'Ultimately, this will make the investment banks' research more valuable because right now a great piece we put out may get lost in the clutter -- the noise and confusion that our customers are cluttered with,' says Joseph Sommer, director of U.S. electronic trading and connectivity services with Credit Suisse First Boston and sell-side co-chair of the RIXML.org steering committee. 'If we can help sort out that clutter and we have quality content, it should stand out, so it's worth the effort.' Currently, buy-side institutions are bombarded with thousands of pieces of information from sell-side firms, communicated in dozens of different protocols. That means searches through such a body of data are highly inefficient and often fruitless. David Seibert, vice president of investment systems with T. Rowe Price and buy-side steering committee co-chair of RIXML.org, says that the formation of the group, which will be limited to 10 buy- and 10 sell-side institutions, was initiated by T. Rowe Price because of frustration it felt when attempting to co-mingle research from various sources. To really become involved, firms interested in participating in RIXML.org can contact the group using information provided on their Web site. Sommer says firms can join RIXML.org to become more involved and help fund the effort. Dues for a buy-side firm are $20,000, a sell-side firm $110,000. 'We didn't want to have buy-side firms that were able to devote people and could contribute to the protocol but decided not to because of the up-front costs,' he says, 'so the sell-side is in a sense subsidizing the work.' He further explains the dues by noting that it took a while for FIX to get off the ground because it was not a funded effort. The group will be working to develop a beta version of RIXML in January, which will be released to the public. A 30-day comment period will follow when the group will look at submitted concerns and suggestions, acting on those they deem legitimate. After the comment period, a recommendation will be released that will essentially constitute version 1.0 of the specification, according to Chris Betz, vice president of the institutional equity division at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and sell-side co-chair of RIXML.org." See: "Research Information Exchange Markup Language (RIXML)."

• [December 28, 2000] "A New XML-based Standard for Weather Derivatives Transactions Proposed. WeatherML Aims to Simplify Trading of Weather Derivatives." By Crisitna McEachern. In WebTech Wall Steet and Technology (WST) (December 22, 2000). "XML has taken a strong foothold in the financial services industry, and the weather derivatives market is next in line for a standard trading protocol of its own. The Weather Risk Advisory, a software and consulting company focusing on weather derivatives, is leading an initiative to develop WeatherML, an XML-based data protocol that looks to be a standard for the electronic processing of weather derivatives. The development will be spearheaded on an international basis by the WeatherML Steering Committee, which will include representatives from various areas of the weather derivatives community such as trading organizations, banks, insurers, reinsurers and brokers. The tentative proposal calls for the first version of WeatherML to be released in the second quarter of next year. The WeatherML Steering Committee recently submitted its proposal to the Weather Risk Management Association (WRMA), the weather derivatives industry trade group for its opinion and possible endorsement. WeatherML will be used to tag data on weather derivatives transactions. 'WeatherML creates a standard so people can build an interface from their systems to WeatherML and then communicate with anyone in the market that is using WeatherML,' says Gautam Jain, director at Weather Risk Advisory. He adds that WeatherML would be useful in areas such as streamlining the electronic confirmation of trades and furthering the growth of the weather derivatives market as a whole with the spread of software development for the industry... The proposal and draft aspects of WeatherML are available for comment at . The steering committee is seeking advice and suggestions by interested weather derivatives industry parties before the initial version is released. 'The key thing is WeatherML needs to be used by active traders in the market so there has to be a process where by involved parties can contribute to the standard such that it is useful and practical on a day to day basis,' says Jain. Once the standard is released, users would be able to either build their own interfaces to the WeatherML standard, or they could opt for a 'conversion tool' which Jain says would be a mapping engine to allow users to map proprietary data base information to the standard and vice versa. Although the proposed WeatherML standard will initially only cover transaction information, Jain adds that if it catches on with market participants in the future WeatherML could also incorporate all weather derivatives market data into the standard protocol." See: "Weather Markup Language (WeatherML)."

• [December 28, 2000] "Features: Staying in Synch." By Didier Martin. From XML.com (December 27, 2000). ['SyncML is a new standard aimed at keeping your data synchronized between devices both large and small. Didier Martin provides a whirlwhind tour of this new technology.'] "On December 7th, 2000, the SyncML consortium, founded by Ericsson, IBM, Lotus, Motorola, Nokia, Palm, Matsushita, Psion and Starfish, released the specifications for version 1.0 of a synchronization protocol based on HTTP and XML. In contrast to its cousin, the WebDAV protocol, the SyncML protocol does not add any new HTTP verbs, but uses the usual HTTP 1.1 verbs like GET and POST. And, similarly to an other cousin, the SOAP protocol, this XML-based protocol uses an XML format to carry its payload. SyncML's purpose is to allow the synchronization of data. For instance, to synchronize a contact list between local store resident on a palm computer and a network store resident on a corporate server; or to synchronize an event list between a calendar resident on a PC and a calendar resident on a smart mobile phone...SyncML servers exchange packages of information. To do so, SyncML provides a set of commands that each SyncML agent interprets. SyncML sits on top of several transport protocols, including HTTP and Bluetooth (note: Bluetooth may be used to transport TCP/IP - do you remember the Russian dolls?). The SyncML protocol itself is encoded in XML. The SyncML consortium provides a toolkit composed of open source modules. These modules, and the SyncML specifications, can be freely downloaded..." See "The SyncML Initiative."

• [December 28, 2000] "XML-Deviant: The 12 Days of XML Christmas." By Leigh Dodds. From XML.com (December 27, 2000). ['A light-hearted review of XML developer community 2000 as seen through the watchful eye of the XML-Deviant.'] "As the year 2000 draws to a close, the XML-Deviant looks back at the year's events in the XML developer community, bringing you the 12 Days of XML Christmas. Twelve Contentious Topics: The great thing about the XML community is that it's not afraid to face up to the hard questions; XML-DEV being particularly vociferous. This year has been no different, and we've seen a number of contentious debates..."

• [December 28, 2000] "XML standards draft near. MISMO expects 'dictionary' to be ready soon." By [Staff]. In Inman News Features (December 27, 2000). "The XML standards group of the Mortgage Bankers Association of America is expected to have a working draft for standards within a few weeks. The 'Mortgage Application Logical Data Dictionary' is expected to cover the origination aspects of the mortgage lending process. Previous standards have been set for credit, underwriting and service ordering. Those standards are expected to be meshed with origination standards by the Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization and its Mortgage Application Workgroup. MISMO's goal is to create a XML-based document that could start at a consumer-based Web site, move along to an LOS system, be forwarded to a credit agency, be sent back with attached credit data, and then sent to an AUS system and later returned. 'MISMO and this workgroup are moving extremely fast and continue to make exceptional progress in industry standards,' said Todd Luhtanen, chair of the workgroup and technology director at Dynateck, which provides mortgage software... MISMO's members include Dynatek, MortgageFlex, Interlinq, Gallagher, Cybertek and Alltel, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and several other organizations. Some 100 industry leaders attended a recent five-day conference in Milwaukee, Wis., to discuss the latest developments concerning mortgage industry standards with XML, or Extensible Markup Language. XML will provide universal data standards for documents and make electronic transmission of documents easier and more efficient, in a universal format. At mid-November's National Association of Realtors annual convention in San Francisco, another XML standards group was announced, in response to the Homestore.com- and NAR-driven Real Estate Transaction Standards XML group. Called Alliance for Advanced Real Estate Transaction Technology, it brought together nearly 20 companies in Web realty, that were concerned that standards were moving too slowly and that RETS members had agendas designed to protect self interests..." See "Mortgage Bankers Association of America MISMO Standard."

• [December 28, 2000] "XML vs. HTTP." By Mike Brown. Date: 28-Dec-2000. ['I have written a little white paper to inform my fellow developers about the risks inherent in HTTP transmissions of XML, especially when processing an XML document as if it were (or as) an HTML form data submission...'] "XML documents, and to varying degrees SGML and HTML documents, can be thought of as having 4 main layers, in order of increasing abstraction: (1) a contiguous bit sequence (binary data) that represents; (2) a contiguous character sequence (textual data) that is divided into; (3) segments of markup and character data, that together represent; (4) a hierarchy of logical constructs: elements, attributes, character data, etc. Programmers may have to work with a document at any of these levels of abstraction. For example, the DOM API provides access to a document's logical constructs, while an HTTP transmission must work with a document as binary data. However, the abstractions in an SGML, HTML or XML document are somewhat more complex, because of the concept of entities. [...] The only way to reliably construct such a message is to have complete control over the sending end. This means not using HTML forms at all. It also means having complete control over the receiving end, not relying on anyone else's HTTP server or servlet implementations. Since common implementations cannot be trusted to avoid making silly assumptions about the nature of the POST data, the receiver must be a custom HTTP implementation. If this level of control over sender and receiver is guaranteed, then there is the added benefit of being able to transmit multiple entities in a single HTTP message, using the multipart/mixed media type, which works just like multipart/form-data but without the Content-Disposition: form-data; name='foo' headers on each body part. But if this control cannot be guaranteed, the best one can do is to use multipart/form-data and trust that the receiver can handle it properly. If the goal is to not have a general-purpose XML transmission system, then the best option is to configure the sender to never attempt to send XML consisting of anything other than pure ASCII. Then, any of the methods described above will work. This conclusion might beg the question: Doesn't having complete control over the sender and receiver defeat the main purpose of using XML? The answer is no, not really, because the receiver is not necessarily the application that will be using the data; it might just be a way-station on the XML entity's journey to an application that will actually process the file. The point of having control over both ends of the HTTP transmission is just to ensure that the entity is not corrupted before it gets to the application..."

• [December 22, 2000] "XML Encryption Syntax and Processing." Version 1.0. 15-December-2000. By Blair Dillaway, Barbara Fox, Takeshi Imamura, Brian LaMacchia, Hiroshi Maruyama, Jim Schaad, and Ed Simon. ['We respectfully submit the attached specification as a suggested starting point for the XML Encryption Working Group effort. This work builds on earlier papers and on-going discussions. We look forward to comments and continuing discussions to resolve the open issues identified in this document.'] "This document specifies how to encrypt data in an XML-conformant manner. It describes how to perform fine-grained, element-based encryption of fragments within an XML Document as well as encrypt arbitrary binary data and include it an XML document. The technical requirements upon which this specification is based are summarized in Section 2. Subsequent Sections describe the XML Encryption syntax, processing rules, and XML Encryption schema along with selected examples of using this technology." See: (1) "XML and Encryption" and (2) the W3C XML Encryption Mailing List Archives.

• [December 22, 2000] "Competing initiatives to vie for security standard." By Jeffrey Burt. In eWEEK (December 21, 2000). "The push to develop an XML-based standard for moving security information across disparate online trading systems is moving under the umbrella of the standards body OASIS. The Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards earlier this month set up a technical committee to create a single standard for security information -- including authentication, authorization and user profiles. The first meeting of the group will be on Jan. 9. Included in the technical committee are backers of two competing programs announced in November whose aim is to develop a standard based on XML (Extensible Markup Language). Netegrity Inc., of Waltham, Mass., is heading a drive to make its Security Services Markup Language, or S2ML, the defacto standard in the security information field. Company officials said this week that more than 200 companies have put their support behind the initiative. San Francisco-based Securant Technologies Inc. is pushing its AuthXML program, which has the support of more than 70 companies, some of whom also were involved in the S2ML program. Both initiatives were announced within days of each other. Netegrity officials said they and their partners approached OASIS about creating a technical committee, which was unveiled December 6. Netegrity officials hope to have another meeting in February and a final specification developed by the middle of 2001. The committee initially will use the S2ML initiative as the basis for its work. Securant officials already have issued a third version of the AuthXML specification and will bring that to the technical committee..." See "Security Services Markup Language (S2ML)" and "AuthXML Standard for Web Security."

• [December 22, 2000] "XML: It's the great peacemaker." By Wylie Wong. In eWEEK (December 21, 2000). ['Extensible Markup Language accomplished the seemingly impossible this year: It brought bitter software enemies together. to speak the same tongue.'] "Rivals such as Microsoft, Oracle and IBM flooded the wires and airwaves with praise for XML, a software standard that allows the exchange of information over the Internet. All these companies had the same dream--creating Web-based software and services--and XML was a core piece of their diverse strategies. XML is an early Web standard for information exchange that proponents say will reshape business-to-business communications. It not only allows customers to easily and cheaply conduct online transactions with their customers and partners, it also delivers sound, video and other data across the Web. In 2000, XML was the great peacemaker. Rival software companies put their competitive differences aside to pursue high-profile alliances and work on potential new Web standards. Those standards helped further their collective goal -- to make XML the preferred language for companies communicating online. These joint efforts have eased fears that companies would merely work XML into a form that suited only their purposes--a move that many analysts agree could irreversibly damage XML's appeal industrywide and stymie many technological innovations. Companies such as Microsoft are placing a lot of currency in XML. The technology is seen as the key to a new future, one in which customers won't have to buy and install software on a personal computer but will be able to download what they need over the Internet. Such a vision, companies say, could be revolutionary for the industry, eliminating installation problems, maintenance costs and other upgrade concerns. While the vision has long been touted by Oracle, Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, IBM and others, Microsoft jumped on the bandwagon over the summer with a two-year plan to release new software products that link the Windows operating system closer to the Web. Oracle earlier this month announced its own plans to help companies deliver services over the Web..."

• [December 22, 2000] "Developers back new XML specification." By Roberta Holland. In eWEEK (December 18, 2000). "With the time frame for delivering the ebXML standard pushed up two months, companies working on the initiative say they already have plans to support the specifications in their products and services. Last week, 16 vendors gathered in San Francisco to prove Electronic Business Extensible Markup Language is real and works. The group announced that three of the ebXML specifications are now stable enough for adoption: transport routing and packaging, also known as message service; trading partner agreements; and the registry and repository. Members also said the final delivery date for all of ebXML was moved up from May to March. The effort is sponsored by the United Nations and the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards. Because the specifications that make up ebXML can be implemented piecemeal, several companies are already fine-tuning products that support the standard. XMLSolutions Corp. supports early versions of the messaging and registry-and-repository specifications in its business integration platform. The product line will be enhanced to support ebXML interfaces as the standard evolves, said JP Morgenthal, chief technology officer of XMLSolutions, in McLean, Va. 'ebXML itself is still very embryonic at this point,' said John Ousterhoutcq, Interwoven Inc.'s chief scientist, adding that ebXML's transactional capabilities go hand in hand with Interwoven's bailiwick of content management. 'Some pieces are starting to take shape. Our support is going to evolve. We can adapt pretty quickly because there is such strong XML support in our products already.' Ousterhout added that once the XML infrastructure is in place, it's easy to handle different XML dialects. The TeamSite product already supports ebXML because of its open framework. Upcoming products will have more specific support for ebXML. Bob Sutor, IBM's director of e-business standards strategies, said his company is not yet announcing its product plans for ebXML support. But Sutor said in general he expects to see product announcements from vendors in the second quarter of 2001, with some products materializing in the third quarter. 'ebXML itself is a big collection of technologies, but you can pick and choose among them,' said Sutor, in Somers, N.Y. IBM is sorting through 'what pieces our customers will want first.' A spokeswoman for Sun Microsystems Inc. said the company likely will have news about its plans to support ebXML in a couple of months. However, the recently released Java API for Messaging, known as JAXM, does include early support for the transport routing and packaging specification. B2B integrator Viquity Corp also plans to add ebXML support once the standard is complete..."

• [December 22, 2000] "OASIS Registry/Repository Technical Specification." Working Draft 1.1 December 20, 2000. 152 pages. ['The new version of the OASIS Registry/Repository Technical Specification resulting from the face-to-face meeting in Washington, DC on December 5, 2000, and the follow-on teleconference December 15, is now available.'] Abstract: "This specification represents the collective efforts of the Registry and Repository Technical Committee of OASIS, the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards. It specifies a registry/repository information model and a registry services interface to a collection of registered objects, including but not limited to XML documents and schemas. The information model uses UML diagrams and written semantic rules to specify logical structures that serve as the basis of definition for an XML-based registry services interface. The information model is used for definitional purposes only; conformance to this specification depends solely on correct implementation of some designated subset of the registry services interface. The registry services interface consists of request services to create new registry information or to modify or supplement existing registry entries. It also consists of query and retrieval services to search registry content and retrieve selected registry information, or to retrieve registered objects via object references or locators. The registry services interface supports browsing by arbitrary electronic agents as well as interoperation among conforming implementations. This document deals primarily with the registry, although some scenarios and requirements for the repository are included. This document is a draft proposal under development by the Oasis Registry/Repository Technical Committee. Its purpose is to solicit additional input and to convey the current state of the Oasis Registry/Repository Information Model and Technical Specification...This document represents a work in progress upon which no reliance should be made. Its temporary accessibility, until more permanent accessibility is established at the OASIS web site, is via the following URL: ftp://xsun.sdct.itl.nist.gov/regrep/OasisRegrepSpec.pdf. See the announcement from Len Gallagher, "New Version 1.1 - OASIS Reg/Rep Technical Specification." The objective of the Registry and Repository Committee is to develop one or more specifications for interoperable registries and repositories for SGML- and XML-related entities, including but not limited to DTDs and schemas. XML.org, an initiative of OASIS, intends to construct and maintain a registry and repository in accordance with these specifications, including an interface that enables searching and browsing of the contents of a repository of those entities. The registry and repository are to be designed to interoperate and cooperate with other similar registries and repositories..." [cache]

• [December 22, 2000] "Secret project may be Microsoft's next big deal." By Mary Jo Foley. From CNET News.com (December 22, 2000). "One of Microsoft's goals in the year 2001 will be to prove it hasn't lost its old development magic. Microsoft's new stealth service, known as Netdocs, is slated to be one of its showcase .Net building blocks, but company officials steadfastly refuse to discuss it publicly. .Net is Microsoft's shorthand for its corporate strategy to deliver software as a service. According to its .Net road map, applications and pieces of applications soon will be delivered as 'services' that can be rented over the Internet. Microsoft officials would not comment on when Netdocs will debut. The service is not yet thought to be in alpha or beta testing, however. According to sources, Netdocs is a single, integrated application that will include a full suite of functions, including email, personal information management, document-authoring tools, digital-media management, and instant messaging. Microsoft will make Netdocs available only as a hosted service over the Internet, not as a shrink-wrapped application or software that's preloaded on the PC. Netdocs will feature a new user interface that looks nothing like the company's Internet Explorer Web browser or Windows Explorer. Instead, Netdocs is expected to offer a workspace based on Extensible Markup Language (XML), where all applications are available simultaneously. This interface is based on .Net technology that Microsoft, in the past, has referred as the 'Universal Canvas.' Some people inside Microsoft describe Netdocs as a '.Net application/service for knowledge workers.' Others call it a next-generation productivity suite being designed for individuals to share personal information and collaborate. Whether Netdocs is targeted for individuals, small businesses, or corporate customers, the technology could change the way Microsoft customers handle many tasks--ranging from signing up for their online services, to building configurable home pages, to managing their own .Net billing, support, and administrative services... In many ways, the Netdocs-Office face-off epitomizes the challenges Microsoft, as a company, is facing as it attempts to move from offering packaged PC software to delivering software services over the Web. While some within the company continue to bank on the future of shrink-wrapped applications, others believe hosted applications that are 'rented' via a subscription model are poised gain acceptance soon."

• [December 22, 2000] "Next-generation XHTML stripped down for handhelds." By Paul Festa. From CNET News.com (December 19, 2000). "With a keen eye on small Web access devices, a major standards organization on Tuesday recommended a stripped-down version of its replacement for HTML. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) gave its seal of approval to Extensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML) Basic, a subset of XHTML that backers hope will impose some discipline on a proliferation of new Web lingos for small computing devices. Based on Extensible Markup Language (XML), the full XHTML version is ultimately meant to replace HTML, long known as the lingua franca of the Web. XML, also a W3C recommendation, allows for the creation of new Web languages and the tagging of digital documents to make them easier for computers to read and manipulate. First issued nearly a year ago, the full-featured XHTML recommendation so far has failed to make a significant mark on the Web. By supporting XML, new browsers can read XHTML pages, and some groups such as the W3C have begun writing their pages in the markup language. But backers say the markup language's biggest opportunity is to shape the way Web pages are written for non-PC Web browsing devices. "In terms of desktop browsers, little has changed since XHTML's recommendation," said David Raggett, senior architect of Openwave Systems and a W3C fellow. "Most public attention has been on the wireless stuff and television. As we start wanting to access the Web from other devices from anywhere at any time, we're using devices with limited memory and processing power. So it's important to distill HTML down." With the XHTML Basic subset, the W3C is in one sense returning to HTML's less complex roots. Early versions of the markup language were extremely simple. But as demand forced browser makers to add bells and whistles, the language and the browsers designed to render it became bigger and demanded more computing power..." See the announcement.

• [December 22, 2000] "UDDI: An XML Web Service." By Chris Lovett. From MSDN 'Extreme XML' Column (December 18, 2000). ['Columnist Chris Lovett examines the ins and outs of the Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration (UDDI) Service.'] "The Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration (UDDI) Service is now up and running at Microsoft, IBM, and Ariba. This is an online Web Service that you can use from your applications to dynamically discover other online services, all neatly packaged in a simple XML interface. For Extreme XML readers, passing XML around between client application and middle tier servers is nothing new. We've been doing this since 1998. It is nice, however, to see ongoing industry momentum in this direction that results in useful services like this one. So let me just dive right in to the nitty-gritty. All you really need to know is the URL to post the XML to. It took some digging to find the following three URLs... Conclusion: If you're building applications that need to dynamically wire up to services provided by external business partners, then you definitely need to think about wiring your applications to the UDDI registry. Think of it as though it were DNS for the business application layer. The interesting thing is that you could add, change, and remove access points in real time and thereby work around the one week or more delay involved in DNS propagation. Many people are asking what to do after finding a company and its registered services in the UDDI directory. Well, UDDI does not claim to solve everything. Attempting to spec out the master business-to-business protocol that encompasses everything ever invented is a huge undertaking and probably will never happen. The UDDI theory is that your applications will know how to do business with some well-known kinds of business protocols, and these protocols will be described in a well-known way so that you can dynamically find other businesses that support that protocol. Alternatively, you may have a small number of well-known, trusted global business partners with whom you are simply using UDDI to find new services provided by those partners. In this case, you probably already have other trusted channels established for downloading the adapters needed to connect to each service. Bottom line: UDDI is definitely a big step in the right direction." See also the UDDI drill-down example. References: "Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration (UDDI)."

• [December 22, 2000] "Catalog Browsing Design." By Heidi Housten. From MSDN Duwamish Online (December 12, 2000). ['This article discusses the design considerations of using XML/XSL to create a generic, HTML-based catalog system for Duwamish Online.'] "The Duwamish Online application is designed for wide browser support and therefore does not rely on advanced browser features, such as client-side scripting or client-side XML support... The Duwamish Online catalog design optimizes usability by simplifying navigation and maximizing responsiveness. Navigation is simplified through previews of content that indicate what lies ahead along any navigation path, by making it easy to backtrack, and by good integration between catalog and shopping cart. Responsiveness is maximized through caching of static HTML and XML catalog data on the Web server. Caching helps the application scale by vastly reducing the work required to service up to 90 percent of application requests. Maintainability is enhanced by application services that return catalog data as XML and by generating HTML through XSL transformations in the presentation layer. Catalog characteristics, such as the data that is previewed and recursion depth of category lists, can be changed at the presentation layer by merely modifying the XSL style sheets. For a comparative catalog browsing implementation based on the XML features of SQL Server 2000, see 'Duwamish Online SQL Server XML Catalog Browsing'."

• [December 22, 2000] "Solving the SAX Puzzle: Off-the-Shelf XML Processing." By Eldar A. Musayev, Ph.D. MSDN Web Workshop. December 14, 2000. ['This article shows how to capitalize on component-based design by considering a simple SAX program that utilizes this advantage.'] "SAX (Simple API for XML) is usually considered a low-level, high-performance XML parser. However, it offers another important advantage -- component-based design. This article shows how to capitalize on component-based design by considering a simple SAX program that utilizes this advantage... Though many components are not yet off-the-shelf, there are existing components that make implementation simpler. Furthermore, there are more components on the way. In the interim, using SAX allows you to obtain an object-oriented, component-based design for your eBusiness XML application.

• [December 22, 2000] "Using W3C XML Schema. Part 2." By Eric van der Vlist. From XML.com. December 15, 2000. ['The second half of a comprehensive introduction to the W3C's XML Schema Definition Language, including coverage of namespaces, object-oriented features and instance documents.'] "In the first part of this series we examined the default content type behavior, modeled after data-oriented documents, where complex type elements are element and attribute only, and simple type elements are character data without attributes. The W3C XML Schema Definition Language also supports the definition of empty content elements, and simple content elements (those that contain only character data) with attributes..." See related resources in "XML Schemas."

• [December 22, 2000] "W3C XML Schema Tools Guide." ['A run-down of editors, validators and code libraries with support for XML Schema.'] By Eric van der Vlist. From XML.com. December 15, 2000. "The list of tools supporting XML Schema is still short, reflecting the fact that the specification is not yet a W3C Recommendation. When using a tool, check that it supports the version of XML Schema you are expecting: we've listed the support available at the time of writing. The most recent version of XML Schema is the Candidate Recommendation, dated 2000/10/24."

• [December 22, 2000] "Using XML and Relational Databases with Perl." By Kip Hampton. From XML.com. December 15, 2000. ['This article explores how Perl can be used to transfer data between XML and relational databases, and how XML can bridge two disparate databases.'] "This month we're focusing on integrating XML with relational databases. There's not enough room in this column to give a comprehensive treatment of this topic, but we will explore a few of the options available for transferring data between XML documents and relational databases. I'll demonstrate how using Perl can make these types of transfers painless and straightforward. You may not want to try using XML to transfer terabytes of data over the wire, but having a basic understanding of how Perl can be used to help XML and databases work together is a useful skill to add to your bag of tricks. All the examples from this article are available from the download link... In this column, I've only scratched the surface of how you might use Perl to combine the power of relational databases with the portability of XML. I do hope, however, that the examples covered will give you enough confidence to begin experimenting on your own. And remember, new Perl XML modules are being released all the time, and many older ones are adding XML support, so be sure to check CPAN early and often." See related resources in: (1) the CPAN [Comprehensive Perl Archive Network] archives and (2) "XML and Perl."

• [December 22, 2000] "XML Q&A: Will XML replace HTML?" By John E. Simpson. From XML.com. December 15, 2000. ['The relationship between XML and HTML is often confusing for the Web developer coming to XML for the first time... The author addresses web developers new to XML, examining whether XML will indeed replace HTML on the web.'] Addresses (1) "Will XML ever replace HTML?" and (2) "Is it possible to change an HTML-based web page into XML?"

• [December 20, 2001] "Axis Powers: Part One." By Bob DuCharme. From XML.com. December 20, 2000. "XPath expressions play an important role in XSLT because they let stylesheet instructions flexibly identify the parts of the input document -- or, in XSLT terms, the nodes of the source tree -- to act on. Let's review the basics. An XPath expression consists of one or more location steps separated by slashes. Each step consists of an axis specifier, a node test, and an optional predicate. For example, the one-step XPath expression following-sibling::para[3] uses an axis of following-sibling, a node test of para, and a predicate of [3] to identify the third para element of the nodes in the context sibling's following-sibling axis. (The context node refers to the source tree node that the XSLT processor is currently dealing with -- usually because it's one of the nodes named by the xsl:template element's match condition or by an xsl:for-each instruction's select attribute.) The two-step XPath expression child::wine/child::prices contains the prices children of any wine children of the context node. In this two-part column, we'll examine the various axes you can use and their potential role in XSLT transformations. [...] In the next column, we'll look at the remaining axes: preceding, following, descendant, descendant-or-self, self, and namespace. Meanwhile, you can play with the examples shown in this column by downloading the zip file ." For related resources, see "Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL/XSLT)."

• [December 15, 2000] "Deconstructing Babel: XML and application integration." By Henry Balen. In Application Development Trends Volume 7, Number 12 (December 2000), pages 19-23. Cover story. "XML may not yet be a true 'silver bullet,' but it can be used to great effect in integration projects if IT managers create a detailed plan that can overpower its weaknesses. No application is an island. In today's world of ever-increasing complexity, it is imperative that applications talk and cooperate. And to achieve business objectives in the world of the Internet, there is the additional need for a common vocabulary. Applications need to talk with one another -- both within the enterprise and between business entities -- as well as over local-area networks, the Internet and now wireless networks. This is a perennial problem in the technology industry. Every few years a new 'silver bullet' rises from the melee of products promising to solve all our integration problems. The latest 'silver bullet' is not a product, but technology that comes in the form of the eXtensible Markup Language (XML). And you would be hard-pressed to find a vendor that does not currently support XML or have a plan to support it. This article takes a look at the implications of XML when applied to application integration. I am sure after reading it you will know all there is to know about XML and application integration. Wait a minute, is that a pig flying past my window? On a more serious note, you may gather that I am somewhat skeptical of the prevailing attitude in our industry of 'one solution fits all.' Though all is not lost, there is an infrastructure of technologies under development that will go a long way toward providing a strong base for solving most integration problems. At the core of all of these technologies is XML. XML and the related technologies it has spawned can be used to help with the integration process. XML has been dubbed 'the new EDI' by some observers. It is used to define standards for exchanging information in various industries. Repositories of these document standards (schemas) can be found on the Internet at sites such as biztalk.org and xml.org. XML-based communication protocols are also under development. One example is the work being done on XML RPC, the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) and ebXML...There are three aspects of inter-application communication: (1) Transport -- how to get information across the wire; (2) Protocol -- how to package the information sent across the wire; and (3) Message -- the information itself. The transport is usually a lower level network standard such as TCP/IP. Inter-process communications standards, such as CORBA, DCE and DCOM, have their own protocols that sit on top of such transports. The protocol used depends on the communication mechanism. Standards may use different protocols to communicate: CORBA uses IIOP, while electronic mail uses SMTP. Each of these protocols allows you to package a message, specify a destination and get the message to the designated location. In protocols that support remote method invocation (RMI), the destination can consist of an object reference and method. With each of these protocols, the user defines the message that is sent across the wire. In the case of CORBA, DCE, DCOM and so on, the message is defined using an Interface Definition Language (IDL). In E-mail and message-oriented middleware (MOM) it can be more fluid. No matter what you use, there is an agreement between the sender and receiver about the meaning of the message. The meaning is not transferred with the message. So why use XML? In XML, documents contain meta-information about the information being transmitted, and can be extended easily. However, XML is less efficient than transmitting the information using a binary protocol. One advantage, though, is that humans and computers can both read the document..."

• [December 15, 2000] "Tools Update: RSSApplet and Xparse-J." By Michael Classen. From Webreference.com Exploring XML Column (December 15, 2000). "Webmasters need tools for many technologies, and XML is no exception. The venerable RSSViewerApplet had a few problems and limitations that have been removed in the newly released version 1.2. First and foremost there is better compatibility with the RSS 0.91 version upgrade from 0.9: The top level element in the RSS file can now also be <rss version="0.91"> instead of <rdf:RDF rdf:xmlns="..." xmlns="..."> Optional elements are really optional now. A number of bugs were related to omitting optional elements in the RSS file. Improved error handling and more useful error messages... RSSApplet can be downloaded in both source and binary form." See "RDF Site Summary (RSS)."

• [December 15, 2000] "XML rolls along. [Editorial.]" By Michael W. Bucken. In Application Development Trends (December 2000), page 4. "The Extensible Markup Language (XML) has been examined several times by Application Development Trends' stable of expert writers. Almost two years ago, an ADT Cover Story, 'XML: The last silver bullet' [April 1999, p. 24], concluded that the technology 'could just be' the latest silver bullet able to connect disparate technologies far more easily than ever before. The technology has yet to become a true 'silver bullet,' but nonetheless, XML has been almost universally embraced in the technology world. It has become harder to find a supplier whose products do not somehow incorporate XML technologies. Its backers span both sides in the Java wars as Microsoft Corp., Sun Microsystems Inc. and IBM have each touted XML as a key piece of their software strategy. The continual changes in the XML technology represent a significant issue to IT development managers..."

• [December 15, 2000] "XML factions develop along familiar lines. Sun, Microsoft spearhead different initiatives." By Margret Johnston. In InfoWorld (December 14, 2000). "Anyone wondering what Microsoft and Sun Microsystems are thinking about each others' work on XML (extensible markup language) got some insight this week when the two companies made competing announcements about their latest activities to advance the use of the language to support Internet-based b-to-b (business-to business) transactions. Although neither side characterized the situation as war, they sniped at each other on Wednesday, a day after a faction led by Sun held a news conference in San Francisco to demonstrate business transactions over ebXML (electronic business XML). On the same day, and not by coincidence, ebXML faction officials said, Microsoft announced the release of BizTalk Server 2000, an XML product that allows businesses to integrate applications across differing platforms using the Internet. A Sun official complained that Microsoft was trying to steal ebXML's thunder by releasing its BizTalk news on the same day as the ebXML demonstration, but a Microsoft official said the company was only sticking to a previously announced schedule. 'I don't find it surprising that Microsoft would come out and make an announcement on top of us,' said Bill Smith, a member of the ebXML initiative's executive committee. 'They just pushed (BizTalk) on the same day, obviously, for competitive reasons.' Microsoft announced Tuesday that the 'gold' code for BizTalk Server 2000, in beta since August, has been sent to manufacturing. The CDs will ship in late January or early February in keeping with the road map Microsoft announced at the Comdex trade show in Las Vegas in November. BizTalk Server 2000 is one of the components of BizTalk Framework, a foundation of Microsoft's attempt to recast the Windows operating system and Windows applications as a platform for the Internet. Microsoft says the framework, not the server, is the more 'apples to apples' comparison with ebXML, and it said there was a parallel between the (ebXML) demonstration and its own framework. 'The results shown by the ebXML proof of concept are entirely consistent with what our partners and customers have demonstrated using SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol) and the BizTalk Framework over the last year,' said David Turner, Microsoft product manager and technical evangelist for XML technologies, in an e-mail response to a question about Microsoft's position on ebXML. At the XML 2000 conference in Washington on Dec. 6, Turner said the architecture Microsoft envisions for XML allows for the exchange of information on any platform, in any program language and across any network. He described Microsoft's investment in XML as 'substantial,' and said the company would continue its involvement in the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium). Dave Wascha, product manager for BizTalk Server 2000, said Sun, Oracle, and other companies have representatives in the W3C and the Internet Engineering Task Force, and those standards bodies are 'the right place to do this work,' Wascha said, who labeled the ebXML faction's announcement on Tuesday a defensive move to create confusion. 'We launched a cool product,' Wascha said. 'Everybody wants to talk about where there is conflict. There isn't any conflict because one of the two [products] exists and the other doesn't.' Wascha accused Palo Alto, Calif.-based Sun of hyping ebXML before it is final and said that Microsoft doesn't have a position on ebXML because 'the spec isn't even done.' He added that he and his colleagues at Microsoft refer to ebXML as 'slideware,' meaning they believe it exists only on presentation slides. Meanwhile, Wascha said that customers have been using BizTalk Framework for more than a year. At Tuesday's demonstration, Smith said the ebXML specification would be ready for vendors to implement after the next meeting of the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) in February, two months ahead of schedule. Taking his turn at Microsoft, Smith criticized the BizTalk Framework, saying that to claim that it is open just because it's based on XML is not sufficient..."

• [December 15, 2000] "Extensible Markup Language Basics: An Overview of XML. Definitions and Discussions." By Lou Marco. In Enterprise Systems Journal (December 2000). ['Need an universal way to format data for presentation on the Web? It's as easy as XML. Learn the basics for Extensible Markup Language (XML) by taking a detailed look at a simple XML document. Learn the important terms, and how to format well-formed and valid documents.'] "This article provides an overview of XML, or Extensible Markup Language, a universal document format for structuring data for presentation on the Web. The article starts with an overview of XML features that overcome existing problems with HTML. Next, the article shows a simple XML document, followed by a discussion of XML document components. The important XML terms, well-formed documents and valid documents are described. XML Document Type Definitions (DTDs) are covered, and an example of a DTD is provided. The article closes with a brief description of related technologies...

• [December 15, 2000] "Transforming a Word document using XML and HTML." By Juan Blanco. From Internet.com ASPWire (December 15, 2000). Web Development for either a corporate Intranet or the Internet inevitably involves the need to represent our data in a Word Document format, especially for those working on Windows platforms. In ASPToday we have seen two approaches covered to achieve this, one via creating a Word object in the server, and the other via the use of the Response.ContentType in ASP. In this article I'm going to demonstrate how we can create an e-Bank statement in a Word Document format using HTML and XML -- first explaining the difference between a Word Document and a simple HTML page, how to create an ASP page to display in the client and finally how to create an XSL stylesheet that will transform XML data into a Word Document."

• [December 13, 2000] "Business transactions over ebXML demonstrated." By Stephen Lawson. In InfoWorld (December 13, 2000). "Ten vendors Tuesday joined forces to demonstrate business transactions over ebXML (electronic business Extensible Markup Language), a specification designed to make electronic trading possible for small- and medium-sized businesses around the world. Sun Microsystems, Cisco Systems, IBM and other vendors participated in the demonstration, in which simulated buyers and sellers found each other, sealed a contract for supplies and exchanged information about materials being transported. The specification is intended to provide a framework for companies to exchange all information necessary for e-commerce without the need for relatively expensive and complicated EDI (electronic data interchange) software. A PC and an Internet connection may be all that is needed to participate in online commerce using ebXML, event organizers said. Sponsored by the Billerica, Mass.-based Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Systems (OASIS), ebXML also is backed by the United Nations Center for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Commerce (UN/CEFACT), the body that created the current international standard for EDI. Tuesday's demonstration here marked the completion of the core of ebXML's messaging (transport, routing and packaging) service, which OASIS officials said was finished ahead of schedule. That part of the specification has been agreed to by representatives of development groups worldwide and is unlikely to change significantly, so vendors can start to write it into products, said Bill Smith, president of OASIS and an employee of Sun's XML Technology Center. The overall specification has not yet received final approval. The other key parts of ebXML -- repository registration and CPA (collaborative partner agreement) -- will be essentially complete by a February meeting of OASIS in Vancouver, Canada, Smith said. At that date, ebXML will be ready for vendors to confidently implement it, two months earlier than had been projected. About 2,000 developers at 100 companies on six continents are working on ebXML, he said. OASIS also is working with the retail industry's Global Commerce Initiative and the Automobile Industry Action Group on developing the standard. The specification is not intended to compete against traditional EDI or against the UDDI (universal description, discovery and integration) standard, but to complement them, according to Sun's Bill Smith and other participants. Whereas UDDI acts simply as a Yellow Pages-type directory, ebXML will include strong provisions for reliability and security, Smith said. For example, UDDI might be adequate for finding a babysitter, ebXML meets the requirements of $100 million deals, he explained." See the ebXML announcement.

• [December 13, 2000] "Tech firms, U.N. develop XML standard." By Wylie Wong. In CNET News.com (December 12, 2000). "A consortium of technology companies and a United Nations organization say they will release a new e-commerce Web standard ahead of schedule, paving the way for a variety of businesses to conduct trades online. Oasis, which includes IBM, Sun Microsystems, BEA Systems and others, has spent the past year working with a U.N. technology group to develop a common way for businesses in various industries to use XML (Extensible Markup Language) to link to one another and conduct trades online. XML is a popular Web standard for businesses in markets such as finance, manufacturing and publishing to exchange information with each other via the Internet. Oasis and the U.N. group said Tuesday they will release a uniform model for XML usage in March, two months ahead of schedule. Their effort, called Electronic Business XML or ebXML, defines a common method for businesses to handle and route data to one another and offers a set of guidelines for specific industries to define their XML vocabularies. XML's popularity is being driven by two overriding trends. The growth in business-to-business e-commerce has required a common language for exchanging information in areas ranging from purchase orders to part descriptions. And in big corporations, the rush to make internal data locked in custom back-end systems available to new Web-based applications has heightened the need for a cross-platform development. Specific industries, such as insurance and health care providers, are building their own XML vocabularies to describe data. Some industries may have data that's specific to their own areas. The travel industry, for example, must define the data structure for travel, destination, restrictions and pricing models. Another advantage of ebXML, say proponents, is that it allows companies using an older data-exchange technology, called Electronic Data Interchange, or EDI, to start using more flexible and potentially cheaper XML-based software. While Oasis and the U.N. want the industries to continue to develop XML vocabularies specific to their markets, the two groups also want to hammer out cross-industry processes for message exchange..." See: "Electronic Business XML Initiative (ebXML)."

• [December 13, 2000] "Microsoft releases BizTalk e-commerce software." By Mary Jo Foley. In CNET News.com (December 12, 2000). "...On Tuesday, Sun and its partners announced a new milestone in the development of the Electronic Business XML (ebXML) infrastructure championed by the standards group Oasis and the United Nations. Also on Tuesday, Microsoft announced that it had released to manufacturing its long-awaited BizTalk Server 2000, Microsoft's XML server. Both technologies are intended to solve the same problem: linking dissimilar computers so companies can share information for e-commerce exchanges. BizTalk Server is one of Microsoft's growing stable of .Net Enterprise server products. The product allows customers to interconnect online marketplaces, XML-enable applications and integrate their back-end systems, according to Microsoft... The sailing has not been smooth for BizTalk Server and the underlying BizTalk Framework. Microsoft announced BizTalk Server in March, 1999, and the product was slated to go to beta in the latter half of that year. Instead, BizTalk Server didn't make it into beta until August 2000. The company in September said BizTalk Server's release date had been pushed into next year. Microsoft said Tuesday that the product will ship in January. Fifty customers are currently deploying the code, which was released on Monday, according to Microsoft. The BizTalk Framework specifies the way companies should exchange data, in Microsoft's view. On Tuesday, Microsoft published the final 2.0 release of the Framework, which specifies how businesses should implement XML and the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) backed by Microsoft, IBM and others." See "BizTalk Framework."

• [December 13, 2000] "Industry Must Embrace Combination of Open Web Access Standards for True Interoperability. No Single Standard Can Do It All." By Nand Mulchandani. December, 2000. Oblix position paper. "The document 'Industry Must Embrace Combination of Open Web Access Standards for True Interoperability' explores the various standards currently available, as well as those in various stages of ratification. On behalf of Oblix, Nand Mulchandani is a member of the proposal committees for S2ML (Security Services Markup Language) and AuthXML (authentication and authorization). Both proposed XML standards have been recently submitted to the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), an international consortium that advances electronic business by promoting open, collaborative development of interoperability specifications.... Adapting one universally accepted open standard has been offered up as the panacea for Internet interoperability issues. While the idea is appealing, it is not realistic. no single standard will solve all interoperability issues. Instead, a combination of different standards is required to produce true interoperability. For instance, two companies may agree on implementing the same XML data exchange format but will still not be able to interoperate if their XML Remote Procedure Call (RPC) mechanisms do not match. By defining such standards, enterprises are able to deploy infrastructure solutions that seamlessly span multiple companies without requiring each individual company to run proprietary, vendor-specific software. Oblix envisions open standards that will encompass identity, authentication, authorization, sessions, and transactions in a combination of XML and other evolving industry standards." See (1) "AuthXML Standard for Web Security" and (2) "Security Services Markup Language (S2ML)."

• [December 13, 2000] "E-provisioning specification started." By Tom Sullivan. In InfoWorld Volume 22, Number 49 (December 04, 2000), page 12. "Several companies, including Novell and Check Point Software Technologies, have begun work on an XML-based specification to ease the task of provisioning resources. The specification, known as ADPr (Active Digital Profile), is being driven by Business Layers, a Rochelle Park, N.J.-based e-provisioning company, along with industry players such as Novell, Check Point Software Technologies, ePresence and Netigy. ADPr is an XML-based schema designed to provide a vendor- and platform-independent exchange of provisioning information to allocate and deploy IT applications, devices, systems, and services to employees, business partners, and customers. In its early stages, the specification is based on Business Layers' software, but it will not be limited to that, according to Adrian Viego, CTO of Business Layers. The listed partners are supporting ADPr through technology as well as volunteering to contribute to the development of the specification. Viego added that if everything goes according to plan, Business Layers hopes to submit the specification early in the second half of next year to the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), an international standards body that creates interoperable specifications." See: "Active Digital Profile."

• [December 13, 2000] "BizTalk Server To Speak Another Dialect." By Charles Babcock. In Interactive Week (December 13, 2000). "Microsoft on Tuesday, December 12, 2000 announced the release of its BizTalk Server 2000, and product manager David Wascha said it will speak the eXtensible Markup Language dialects of RosettaNet, which is sometimes viewed as a competing technology, in the near future. BizTalk Server 2000 comes in two versions: the $4,999 Standard or the $24,999 Enterprise edition. It is an eXtensible Markup Language parsing server meant to allow two businesses to exchange documents in 'a BizTalk Framework envelope,' Wascha said. The document file inside the envelope may be XML-based or any other flat file format, such as Electronic Data Interchange or word processing text, he said. BizTalk Framework makes use of the Simple Object Access Protocol, a draft XML standard submitted to the Internet Engineering Task Force by Microsoft and IBM and supported by Iona Technologies. Microsoft has sponsored a BizTalk forum site where third parties have collaborated on XML dialects using BizTalk Framework. Another XML business initiative, RosettaNet, has been the result of a consortium building XML dialects for specific vertical industry exchanges, starting with the electronics industry. RosettaNet demonstrated the implementation of its XML dialect on Oct. 10, as Compaq Computer, IBM, Intel and other users exchanged documents using the standard. Wascha said Microsoft does not believe its XML initiatives are at odds with RosettaNet. 'BizTalk will talk RosettaNet in the not-too-distant future,' he said, declining to set a date." See the announcement.

• [December 12, 2000] "Remember EDI: Experts Advise Caution with XML and E-commerce." By Joseph McKendrick. In ent - The Independent Newspaper for Windows NT Enterprise Computing [Online] Volume 5, Number 19 (November 22, 2000), pages 24-26. "Business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce and XML may seem all the rage, but they currently only touch 4 percent of operations. A recent study by GE Global Exchange Services estimates that there are 120 billion transactions per year that take place between companies worldwide, but this 'mostly consists of fax or phone transactions,' said Otto Kumbar, vice president of B2B services at GE Global Exchange, at the recent Electronic Commerce World conference in Orlando, Fla. Only about 5 billion of these transactions have been truly automated, he estimates. Kumbar and other e-commerce industry experts speaking at the conference warn that e-commerce and XML may follow the same torturous path that Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) did early. More than a decade ago, EDI promised massive efficiencies and savings in supply chain transactions. Traditional EDI works well in companies that painstakingly deploy it, but the costs and efforts involved in building and organizing the system limits the reach and potential of the technology. The same could hold true in today's e-commerce and XML-based implementations. As with EDI, companies that deploy e-business technologies merely as a cost-saving strategy -- rather than as a strategic market imperative -- are doomed to fail, warns Paul Silverman, chairman and CEO of Ixata Group. While the value proposition of EDI was 'simple and seductive' -- cutting purchase order costs by 90 percent -- it was a losing proposition, Silverman says, who had been active in EDI deployments since the 1980s. 'Many ventures failed. Losers viewed EDI as paper displacement. Winners recognized that EDI created new commerce channels and changed processes, not just displaced paper. It's better to increase costs to speed up processing -- not try to cut costs. The folks building exchanges aren't thinking this way -- they're focusing on commoditizing products.' Kumbar warns that few B2B vendors are actually delivering true back-end B2B integration. In most cases, he says, they're floating press releases that 'promise that you can take a pile of B2B applications and simply combine then with XML'."

• [December 12, 2000] "E-Biz Winners Wave Bye-Bye To EDI." By Sylvia Dennis. From Newsbytes (December 12, 2000). "Electronic data interchange (EDI), once held up as the Holy Grail of businesses in the 1990s, is being forsaken in favor of Internet transactions, a report out today says. The study, from Forrester Research, says that Europe's e-business winners are now migrating from EDI over to Internet-based processing, a move that helps keep costs down, as well as being more efficient. Because EDI is effectively a closed system, while the Net is an open systems environment, the report predicts that many European firms will soon start to review their EDI plans, especially as Extended Markup Language (XML) technology starts to arrive in the marketplace in earnest. Forrester says it expects EDI trade in Europe to peak at 1.5 trillion euros ($1.32 trillion) in 2002, then steadily decline as firms in sectors like computing, travel, and logistics migrate 400 billion euros ($352 billion) of EDI trade to the Net - using both eMarketplaces and extranets - by 2005. Interestingly. Forrester predicts that a large group of European firms face high EDI migration market pressure with low response capability, and unless they can rush to find help to build an Internet infrastructure, will end up facing a lean time. The research firm says that this group, in sectors like logistics, retail, and electronics, will collect only the scraps left behind by more aggressive competitors. Another group - mid-sized firms - the firm adds, with a strong specialization that deflects market pressure, will continue the status quo for lack of pressure and lack of alternatives. However, Forrester says, these firms will increasingly be isolated and ultimately outcast when, for example, organizations from related markets propose substitution services on the open Internet. For its research into EDI, Forrester spoke with 40 managers handling EDI activity at large European businesses."

• "Batch Data Exchange Using XML." By David Emerson (Senior System Architect, Yokogawa Corporation of America). From Plantautomation.com. December, 2000. "The ISA SP88 committee has been working to develop methods for the exchange of batch data such as master recipes, batch schedules and batch histories. To date the S88.02 drafts, for the lack of a better, widely accepted format, have focused on using relational database technology for the transfer of batch data. The wide acceptance of the Extensible Markup Language (XML) since its release by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) in 1998 now provides an ideal candidate format that did not exist when the SP88 committee developed the S88.02 exchange table format. This paper examines the use of XML for the exchange of batch related data. Examples are provided to demonstrate XML's ability to handle loosely coupled systems and complex, hierarchical data... A set of XML schemas based on the S88.02 data model and exchange tables could be created for using XML to exchange batch control related data. A logical set of schemas would be: (1) master and control recipes, (2) batch schedules, (3) equipment definitions, and (4) production information. This grouping would match the data models and exchange table organization. Collectively this group of schemas could be called a Batch Control Markup Language (BatchML or BCML for short) and used as the basis for exchanging batch control related data in a variety of environments and applications. The work being done by the ISA SP88 committee provides a solid basis for the development of different interfaces for the exchange of batch control data. The emergence and wide acceptance of XML in the information technology industry represents a valuable and well suited technology that can be used with the work of the SP88 committee. As the OPC Foundation has done in the development of their batch custom specification, a new group could also use XML to create a Batch Markup Language. A Batch Markup Language coupled with new and existing tools and technology could be used to lower the cost of integration of batch control related, operational and business applications in the batch processing industry."

• [December 11, 2000] "Let's Get in Sync Already. Group Aims To Sync Directories. Proposed standard translates user profiles into common format, but lacks widespread support." By John Webster. In InternetWeek #840 (December 04, 2000), page 13. "Keeping systems, network and application directories in sync has never been a picnic for IT managers. Adding, changing or removing an employee's access rights to a company's data can require changes to numerous network and application directories. In the latest effort to come up with a standard that simplifies that process, a group of vendors last week proposed a specification that provides a common method of formatting a user profile and synchronizing it with XML-based applications, databases and networks. The specification, called the Active Digital Profile, was developed by software vendor Business Layers with support from several directory management and security vendors, including Access360, Netigy, Novell and Oblix. But the group has yet to approach IBM, Microsoft and the Sun-Netscape Alliance-key suppliers of system directories. Their support would be critical for the ADPr spec to be broadly adopted, said International Data Corp. analyst Chris Christiansen. 'Vendors may be hesitant to open up their applications to competing products,' he said. Also, suppliers of directory software have been slow to complete another specification, the Lightweight Duplication/Replication Update Protocol, intended to provide a base method of synchronizing data with directories based on Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, the Internet standard which most directories now support. And there's yet another directory specification, the Directory Services Markup Language protocol, which defines how information is accessed from LDAP directories. Business Layers' officials argue that ADPr complements existing efforts, noting it will translate into common format directory attributes, such as a user's access control rights, an individual's status and whether the user is an employee, business partner or customer. It also tracks other information like an individual's system and connection type. The ADPr effort underscores a key problem many IT shops face. Every time a systems administrator changes information in one directory, it's essential that the same information gets changed in all the other directories. The appeal of ADPr is that it shares personal identification elements across resources, he said. That's important because a large company might have more than 100 directories that contain critical user and device profiles. This determines who has access to sensitive corporate data, including where an employee is located along with his or her computer and network configuration. That's becoming more critical as companies give outsiders access to specific applications and data, observers said. Directory management apps such as Business Layers' Day One and Oblix NetPoint centralize this process by automatically updating back-end data repositories, such as databases, when people get hired, fired or change positions within a company. In turn, ADPr will use XML to extend the reach of these apps directory management capabilities. Still, the group needs to convince other vendors to support the spec. In addition to IBM, Microsoft and Sun-Netscape, it needs support from application providers including Oracle, Peoplesoft and SAP, among others, Hoch said. The group plans to submit ADPr to the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards in mid-2001." See: "Active Digital Profile."

• [December 08, 2000] Privacy Advocates Wary of Data-sharing Standard." By Patricia Jacobus. In CNET News.com (December 07, 2000). "A new technology standard that smoothes the way for online businesses to easily share detailed customer profiles is sounding an alarm for privacy advocates. The Customer Profile Exchange (CPExchange) has developed a standard endorsed by about 90 companies that takes advantage of XML, a programming language that makes it as easy as tapping a computer key to exchange large amounts of information over the Web. Powerful data-sharing technologies in many ways represent the pinnacle of the Internet's potential to breaking down barriers that block the free flow of information and the improvement of business efficiencies. But privacy watchdogs say that's not always a good thing, especially when it comes to safeguarding confidential consumer data, where barriers are desirable. Backers of the CPExchange standard say rich data culled from customers--such as incomes, home addresses and shopping habits--will provide better customer service. As it is, company representatives have a hard time helping customers because information about who they are and what they buy is usually stored in various computer systems. But at least one member of Congress is skeptical. Sen. Richard Shelby, R-ALa., sent a letter Tuesday to the Federal Trade Commission, asking it to review the development of the CPExchange standard and consider its impact on the privacy of consumers... To quell privacy concerns, the CPExchange group, chaired by IBM, included in the standard a way to place tags on consumer profiles, flagging individuals who want to keep their data secret. It is unclear when the software to swap consumer profiles will be available or how it will work. Members of the CPExchange group represent a cross-section of the online business world. Among them are online advertisers 24/7 Media and Engage, brokerage Charles Schwab, and Siebel Systems, which makes software for managing customer service. The 127-page standard, released in October, doesn't limit the amount of information companies can include in the profiles, making it a potential danger zone, according to analysts." See "CPExchange Network."

• [December 08, 2000] "Parsing XML. Your Own 'miniXML' Parser." By David Cox (Xerox). In Dr. Dobb's Journal #320 (January 2001), pages 96-100. The author presents a tree-based "miniXML" parser for XML that is written in C++ using the Standard Template Library for strings and various containers. The parser works with canonical XML, and is very fast, though limited to smaller XML documents. The author concludes from his parser development experience, narrated in the article, that canonical XML is useful, and that small XML parsers embedded in applications can get a lot of work done. The web site contains sample code listings and the complete and source code for the miniXML parser. For related tools, see "XML Parsers and Parsing Toolkits." [cache sources, cache listings]

• [December 08, 2000] "SyncML open sources universal data sync system." By Tony Smith. In The Register (December 07, 2000). "Industry-sponsored standards development body SyncML unveiled version 1.0 of its platform-independent data synchronisation spec today. The organisation, founded back in February by the IBM, Motorola, Ericsson, Psion and Palm, among others, released the system's XML-based data transfer specification and the software behind it free to the public under an open source licence. SyncML's technology essentially allows multiple systems to synchronise data much as Palm's HotSync ensures copies of data on a host PC and a PDA are kept in harmony. SyncML, however, is platform-independent, so neither PIM, say, or PDA need to know how either works in order to communicate. SyncML initally operates over HTTP, WAP's WSP, Bluetooth and IrDA (infra-red) transport protocols, though it is transport-independent. The organisation expects the first SyncML-compliant devices to appear during the first quarter of 2001. SyncML chairman Douglas Heintzman said he expects the number of compliant devices and applications to ramp up significantly throughout the year. Incidentally, SyncML sponsor Palm is expected to ship the next major version of PalmOS during that period, so it's likely the technology will be incorporated into Palm's HotSync, ultimately ending the need for different Conduits for different applications. That said, SyncML's success depends on its acceptance by software and OS vendors. In addition to its eight founder members, the group cites some 500 supporting companies, but the vast majority are small developers and wireless firms..." For description and references, see "SyncML Initiative."

• [December 08, 2000] "XML in .NET The .NET Framework XML Classes and C# Offer Simple, Scalable Data Manipulation." By Aaron Skonnard. From MSDN Online Magazine - January 2001 Issue. December 07, 2000. ['This new suite of XML APIs is modeled after MSXML 3.0 and includes better standards compliance, extensible APIs, and a simpler programming model.'] "Microsoft .NET introduces a new suite of XML APIs built on industry standards such as DOM, XPath, XSD, and XSLT. The .NET Framework XML classes also include innovations that offer convenience, better performance, and a more familiar programming model, tightly coupled with the new .NET data access APIs -- ADO.NET. XmlWriter, XmlReader, and XmlNavigator classes and classes that derive from them, including XMLTextReader and XMLTextWriter, encapsulate a number of functionalities that previously had to be accomplished manually. A discussion of the XMLDOM-Document is also included... In this article I'm going to introduce you to the new suite of .NET XML APIs, commonly referred to as the .NET Framework XML classes. I'll assume you have some knowledge of .NET fundamentals and C# (the language used for the sample code presented in this article). As a standard disclaimer, this article is based on .NET Beta 1 -- the final details are subject to change. Since most aspects of .NET take advantage of XML in one way or another, a significant amount of time and energy went into improving the fundamental suite of XML APIs. The .NET Framework XML classes are built on key industry standards, such as DOM Level 2 Core, XPath 1.0, XSLT 1.0, XML Schemas (XSD), and the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP), but the classes also introduce several new enhancements to improve the overall programming model. In addition to the classic DOM model, the .NET Framework XML classes introduce an innovative stream-based API that offers a pull model interface (as opposed to the traditional SAX push model). Although this is probably the most significant change to the MSXML 3.0 model, several other enhancements were made to improve performance and ease-of-use. The .NET Framework XML classes represent the natural evolution -- not revolution -- of MSXML 3.0 tailored to the .NET architecture. The new framework was modelled after MSXML 3.0, but also adds several improvements -- including better standards compliance, extensible APIs, and a simpler programming model -- all of which were achieved without sacrificing performance. MSXML 3.0 is available today and will continue to be the cornerstone for native COM applications (such as Microsoft Internet Explorer, Dynamic HTML applications, Office, Visual Basic 6.0, and so on) that use XML and is the only viable choice for production code until .NET ships. Developers can even continue using MSXML 3.0 in the .NET world of managed code, using the COM Interop services provided in .NET. To use MSXML 3.0 in .NET, you must first create an assembly for the MSXML 3.0 types using the tlbimp utility that ships with the SDK. Then, you need to import the MSXML namespace and reference the generated assembly at compilation time (via/reference or /r for short)... I've covered the core types that make up the new .NET Framework XML classes, the most important of which are XmlReader and XmlWriter, but you've really only seen the tip of the iceberg. The .NET XML story includes several other meaty topics, including XML integration into ADO.NET, XML serialization, the XSD object model, security and XML digital signatures, ASP.NET native XML integration, Web Services, and more." The article source code is also available.

• [December 08, 2000] "XML for SQL Server 2000 Web Release 1 Beta 2." From MSDN. December 07, 2000. "This beta release of XML for SQL Server 2000 is an update to the components, updategrams and bulk load, that were introduced in Beta 1... Microsoft SQL Server 2000 introduced several features for querying database tables and receiving the results as an XML document. However, as shipped, Microsoft SQL Server 2000 does not allow changes to an XML document as database inserts, updates, and deletes or the loading of large XML files into SQL Server tables. The Web Release 1 Beta 1 of XML for SQL Server 2000 included two major features called Updategrams and Bulk Load that address these needs. These components are updated in this Web Release 1 Beta 2 of XML for SQL Server 2000. What's New in XML for SQL Server 2000 Web Release 1 (WR1) Beta 2: Beta 2 is primarily a bug fix release. Only a few new features have been added: (1) The syntax for DBObject queries has been simplified and formalized. This results in a significant performance increase. (2) An IsXML attribute has been added to template queries to specify whether the parameter is a simple string or an XML fragment. (3) Bulk Load constraint handling has been improved."

• [December 08, 2000] "Reviews: XML 2000 Show Floor Review." By Simon St. Laurent. From XML.com. December 07, 2000. ['New and interesting technologies from the show floor at XML 2000, including Schemantix, Fourthought, Kinecta, Ontopia and Architag.'] "Schemantix was showing a set of open source tools, the Schemantix Development Platform, for building web interfaces on XML Schemas... The Fourthought booth was showing off 4Suite and 4SuiteServer, an open source (Apache license) Python-based set of tools for working with DOM, XSLT, XLink, RDF, XPointer; and opentechnology.org, a web site architecture built on 4Suite... Kinecta is offering a free tool that organizations can use to syndicate content over ICE to as many as five customers. Syndicator Lite, distributed in a pre-release edition at XML 2000, should be available for download in the next few months... Architag International was showing off a final beta version of XRay, their free tool for editing XML. XRay validates documents against DTDs or schemas (currently XDR, including datatypes) continuously while authors type them, and it can show the results of XSLT transformations on the fly as well... Ontopia Demonstrates Topic Map Engine and Navigators: While stamping visitor 'passports,' Ontopia was demonstrating a beta version of their Ontopia Topic Map engine, walking visitors through a topic map describing opera -- operas, composers, cities, and more. 'Ontopia helps users get on top of their data,' said Steve Pepper, CTO of Ontopia. 'It's Intel Inside, but Ontopia on top.' While Ontopia may sound mythical, and acknowledged plenty of competition on the topic maps front..."

• [December 08, 2000] "Talks: Berners-Lee and the Semantic Web Vision." By Edd Dumbill. From XML.com. December 06, 2000. ['In a keynote session at XML 2000 Tim Berners-Lee, Director of the World Wide Web Consortium, outlined his vision for the Semantic Web.'] "In a keynote session at XML 2000 Tim Berners-Lee, Director of the Wide Web Consortium, outlined his vision for the Semantic Web. In one of his most complete public expositions of the vision to date, he explained the layered architecture that he foresees being developed in the next ten years. He kicked off by explaining what he means by the two words 'semantic' and 'web.' Underlying the Web was the philosophy of a navigable space, with a mapping from URI to resources. He stressed that a URI was an identifier for a resource, and not a recipe for its retrieval. Berners-Lee said that in the context of the Semantic Web, the word 'semantic' meant 'machine processable.' He explicitly ruled out the sense of natural language semantics. For data, the semantics convey what a machine can do with that data. In the future, Berners-Lee anticipated that they will also enable a machine to figure out how to convert that data, too. He described the 'semantic test,' which is passed if, when you give data to a machine, it will do the right thing with it. He also underlined that the Semantic Web is, like XML, a declarative environment, where you say what you mean by some data, and not what you want done with it... He explained the importance of RDF/RDF Schema as a language for the description of 'things' (resources) and their types. Above this, he described the ontology layer. An ontology is capable of describing relationships between types of things, such as 'this is a transitive property', but does not convey any information about how to use those relationships computationally. On top of the ontology layer sits the logic layer. This is the point at which assertions from around the Web can be used to derive new knowledge. The problem here is that deduction systems are not terribly interoperable. Rather than design one overarching reasoning system, Berners-Lee instead suggests a universal language for representing proofs. Systems can then digitally sign and export these proofs for other systems to use and possibly incorporate into the Semantic Web. Berners-Lee ended his presentation examining what could be done practically today. He observed that the higher layers of his architecture are likely to take around ten years yet to come to fruition -- most of the new work today is happening on ontologies. Practical solutions include the use of XSLT to derive RDF from XML sources, the work on topic maps and RDF convergence, the emergence of general-purpose RDF databases and engines, and general and specific GUIs for RDF data. Berners-Lee noted that a rearrangement of the metadata activity within the W3C would also have a bearing on Semantic Web work." See (1) the slide presentation and (2) "XML and 'The Semantic Web'."

• [December 08, 2000] "Talks: XML 2000 Focuses on Schemas." By Eric van der Vlist. From XML.com. December 06, 2000. ['Reports from the first afternoon of the "XML Leading Edge" track from XML 2000, which was dedicated to the W3C XML Schema Definition Language.'] "XML 2000 dedicated the first afternoon of its 'XML Leading Edge' track to W3C XML Schema. The sessions highlighted XML Schema's application for validating documents, showed its extensibility, and presented applications that separate logic and presentation from the structure of the document. The first presentation was a rapid overview of the specification, currently a Candidate Recommendation, by Michael C. Sperberg-McQueen, co-chair of the W3C XML Schema Working Group. Sperberg-McQueen began with an introduction in which he explained that error detection, even at a purely syntactic level, may be very beneficial by showing flaws in the expression of what a programmer writes... Matthew Fuchs, from Commerce One, in his presentation entitled 'The Role of an Extensible, Polymorphic Schema Language for Electronic Commerce Communities', talked about the possibilities created by the object-oriented features of W3C XML Schema for defining the extensible vocabularies needed in global marketplaces... Lee Buck, from TIBCO, presented the Schema Adjunct Framework, an initiative to define a common vocabulary to extend W3C XML Schema for different purposes, such as database mappings or business rules validation... Matthew Gertner, from Schemantix, went further down the extensibility path by showing how schema-based development might be 'A New Paradigm for Web Applications'. He begain by saying that rich data types and inheritance are the features that categorize modern computing, going so far as to present W3C XML Schema and its extensions as a 'Universal Data Model' that can be used to define database mappings and to generate the classes of an application." For schema description and references, see "XML Schemas."

• [December 08, 2000] "Talks: Developers' Day at XML 2000." By Edd Dumbill. From XML.com. December 05, 2000. ['The XML Developers' Day at XML 2000, chaired by Jon Bosak, was composed of "late-breaking" developments in XML, and provided many valuable insights into developing XML systems.'] "The session was opened by Simon St.Laurent, who presented Common XML, the first work product of the SML-DEV mailing list. The SML work grew out of a desire to rid XML of unnecessary and complicated constructions... One of the high points of the Developers' Day was that several presentations gave an insight into the implementation of XML processing tools, rather than focusing merely on their specification or usage. Murata Makoto gave one such talk on the computation models used by verifiers for his RELAX XML schema language... David Cleary presented the use of extension features in W3C XML Schema, assuring the audience that 'even though XML Schema looks as if it has everything in there, there are actually things we had to say no to.' He demonstrated how non-native attributes in schemas enabled them to be tied to implementations, e.g., by annotating with correspondences to Java classes or SQL columns... In a fascinating talk, Dongwook Shin of the National Library of Medicine, explained the inner-workings of XML query engines. He presented the different ways indices could be generated for XML corpora, and their relative merits... Truly on the bleeding-edge of development, Dave Carlson of Ontogenics presented work he was doing on modeling XML schemas with UML. By taking the XML serialization of UML, XMI, as an intermediate format, Carlson was able to generate XML Schemas straight from UML by the application of an XSLT stylesheet. He showed off a web application which demonstrated this functionality. [See XMLmodeling.com]..."

• [December 08, 2000] "Edifecs Offers XML Tools For B2B." By Charles Babcock. In eWEEK (November 22, 2000). "Edifecs, a little know software firm that is one of the powers behind the scenes in creating RosettaNet's initial business-to-business exchange formats, is offering a set of tools to make it easier to implement XML exchanges between trading partners. Edifecs has introduced CommerceDesk 4.0, which is built around a core server designed to manage the trading partner relationship, collaboration, testing and validation of links between the two companies and administration of those links. 'By the end of next year, we want to drive down the cost of B2B enablement by 55 to 65 percent,' said Sunny Singh, CEO. Today, despite all the talk about trading partner automation, it still takes 103 days of labor to ramp up an electronic process with a new trading partner, he said. Before electronic exchanges may begin, the trading partners must determine each others capabilities, identify the business processes involved, define the type of information to be exchanged, create standard formats for the exchange and then configure and test systems. The result is that 56 percent of companies conducting B2B processes do so with less than a fourth of their trading partner base, he said. The survey was conducted by Edifecs through survey forms and phone interviews and is available for review at www.edifecs.com. The Java-based CommerceDesk Server 4.0 comes with tightly integrated tools, such as SpecBuilder, an XML schema authoring system, and Formsbuilder, a Web forms builder. It also includes a repository for centralizing and administering the guidelines and standards being used between two trading partners. The first client of CommerceDesk 4.0 is GE Global Exchange Services, a professional services organization for supplying business partner and business on the Web automation. CommerceDesk supports several existing XML standards, including RosettaNet Partner Interface Processes (PIPs), Ariba's CXML and Microsoft's BizTalk. Edifecs has contributed to the specification of RosettaNet PIPs for the electronics industry, which was implemented as a pilot project by Intel, IBM, Philips Electronics, Arrow Electronics and others on Oct. 10. The pilot project defined a set of vertical industry formats for the exchange of information between electronics component producers and buyers." Note the 'Schema Authoring and Management Tools' in CommerceDesk: "Since 1997 we have offered the best selling Edifecs SpecBuilder, a complete desktop solution for developing and managing XML schema and EDI guidelines. SpecBuilder is the richest tool in the category with the most comprehensive support available for industry standards (XML, EDI, and proprietary files such as SAP IDOC). SpecBuilder today is in use with more than 1000 companies worldwide. Part of the CommerceDesk product family, SpecBuilder is sold both as a stand alone product and as part of CommerceDesk 4.0..." See also the announcement: "Edifecs Ships CommerceDesk 4.0, Solution to No. 1 B2B E-commerce Bottleneck. Edifecs CommerceDesk 4.0 streamlines, automates process of bringing trading partners online."

• [December 07, 2000] "Data-synchronizing Specification Released." By Matthew Woollacott. In InfoWorld (December 07, 2000). "Version 1.0 of the SyncML specification, which aims to provide an industry-standard way of synchronizing data between different devices, was released into the public domain Thursday. The announcement was made at a press conference here where members of the SyncML initiative simultaneously announced a SyncML reference tool kit designed to encourage uptake of the technology by vendors. As a result of the announcement, the first SyncML compliant products are expected to hit the market during the first quarter of 2001. The SyncML initiative was founded in February with the stated aim of providing a standardized means of data synchronization as a way of simplifying users' experience by improving upon current proprietary solutions. Initially, the group has targeted PIM-type applications such as calendaring and address books, but the group hopes to broaden its focus in the future. The technology is based on XML, and according to the companies, can be used over a range of transport mechanisms including wire line and wireless HTTP, the Wireless Session Protocol portion of WAP (Wireless Application Protocol), and the Bluetooth infrared standard. Similarly, the group said that the technology is platform-independent and compatible with client devices including EPOC, Java, Linux, PalmOS, Windows, and Windows CE According to O'Brien, SyncML is designed to be invisible to users in that it is meant to be layered onto existing synchronization applications. Starfish, for example, has incorporated it into its TrueSync application and will release the enhanced version early in the new year. O'Brien admitted, however, that some sort of branding effort may be necessary to make users aware they are not buying a proprietary solution. This will be up to individual companies to decide, he said. At the press conference, the companies gave a demonstration of the technology in action. First, a calendar entry was created on a Psion Revo personal organizer. This was then synchronized with a Lotus Domino server, and the entry was subsequently transmitted to a range of devices including a Palm V, Ericsson and Motorola phones, and a Nokia 9210 Communicator where it appeared a few moments later." For description and references, see "SyncML."

• [December 07, 2000] "Backers to Demo Electronic Business XML Specification." By Roberta Holland. In eWEEK (December 07, 2000). "More than a dozen companies involved with the Electronic Business XML (ebXML) effort will gather next week to show a working demo of the specification. The so-called 'proof of concept' demonstration is slated to take place Tuesday in San Francisco. Vendors participating in the event and the drive for the new specification include IBM, Sun Microsystems Inc., Cisco Systems Inc., Extol, Fujitsu, Interwoven, IPNet, Netfish Technologies Inc., Savvion, Sterling Commerce Inc., Viquity, XML Global and XMLSolutions Corp. The demonstration will show that ebXML works and is interoperable. Participants also are expected to announce that the delivery date has been accelerated from May, as originally planned, to as soon as March, sources said. The standards effort was created jointly by OASIS (the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) and the United Nations' branch in charge of e-business. The goal of the initiative is to create a standard framework for businesses to exchange data over the Internet, without having to go through the expense of Electronic Data Interchange. However, officials involved with the effort say companies that have already in