[December 29, 2000]
Market Data Markup Language (MDML).
A recent announcement
from The Financial Information Services Division (FISD) of the
Software and Information Industry Association (SIIA) describes the
formation of an XML for Market Data Working Group. The XML Working
Group will attempt "to consolidate industry efforts to define
the parameters of the XML for market data discussion (i.e.,
the fields needed to describe a security and its price). ['Fields'
mean (e.g.) Identifier, ISIN, CUSIP, Last, Open, Best Bid,
Best Ask, Close, Next Bid, Size, Maturity Date, Coupon, Yield,
Call/Put, Strike Price, etc.] If the industry is able to unify
around a common size and scope definition, FISD is interested in (1)
serving as the facilitator of the discussion to create a standard,
(2) supporting and maintaining the standard as a permanent home and
(3) coordinating with the other major financial industry XML
standards efforts such as NewsML (news), FpML (derivatives), IRML
(investment research) and XBRL (business reporting) as
appropriate."
[December 29, 2000]
Askemos XML-Enabled Application Server.
Joerg
F.Wittenberger posted an announcement for the early release of
the Askemos project (version 0.6), with an invitation for public
evaluation. Askemos is an
"application server targeted towards document management and
workflow tasks... designed to support many application
languages." Description from the README
document: The framework dream began with such notions as "a
rootless object network model, persistent data, non data specific,
XML optimized, flexible name space management, object autonomy, ACID
transactions, simple messaging concept, any extension language
feasible... The framework, when used to support its own development,
will be the basis for the ideal tool for collaborative programming.
This work reflects about the basic mechanism of understanding,
communication and trust -- and how to tell the mechanism apart from
policy. These mechanisms are the basic principles, or common code,
of viable (sustaining) communities, societies etc. as expressed in
their language, rules and laws. As such it's only loosely connected
to software. To put it different, no sane rule or law contradicts
this text. If any did that's a problem/bug of either the rule or
this work. One part of the full text is a project to create an
environment, where these mechanism can be used effectively. The
project implements a framework to manipulate small amounts of
information in the 'dimensions' structure, context interaction and
rights (more to be added if discovered to build
trustworthiness.
[December 29, 2000]
Release of DSML Tools Version 1.0.
Gervase Markham recently
announced the availability of 'DSML Tools' Version 1.0. The DSML
Tools suite is a set of Java utilities for handling Directory
Services Markup Language (DSML) data; the toolset is under
development as part of Markham's third year project. The DSML Tools
"provide the following capabilities: (1) Querying of any LDAP
directory, with search results output as DSML (2) Import of DSML
data into any LDAP directory (3) Directory-context validation of
DSML (checking for illegal attributes in the entries, etc.) (4)
Calculating the differences (for a directory) of two DSML documents
- an XML Diff algorithm for DSML data In other words, this software
makes all LDAP-supporting directories DSML-enabled. In addition to
that, it provides the useful function of checking the integrity of
generated DSML data, and showing at a glance how two data sets
represented as DSML differ.
[December 28, 2000]
NKOS Working Group Develops XML-Based Vocabulary MarkUp Language.
The Networked Knowledge Organization Systems/Services (NKOS)
Working Group is developing an XML DTD/Schema called 'Vocabulary
[Products] MarkUp Language (VocML)' which will support the
structured representation of a wide range of KOS resources,
"including authority files, hierarchical thesauri (including
those with polyhierarchies), classification schemes, digital
gazetteers, and subject heading lists." References for the
group's draft Taxonomy of KOSs and other work products are provided
on the project web site; the site contains a "set of pages is
devoted to the discussion of the functional and data model for
enabling knowledge organization systems (KOS), such as
classification systems, thesauri, gazetteers, and ontologies, as
networked interactive information services to support the
description and retrieval of diverse information resources through
the Internet." A summary of the working group's progress is
provided by Gail Hodge
(Consultant/National Biological Information Infrastructure,
Information International Associates, Inc.) in a recent issue of D-Lib
Magazine. "Interest in controlled vocabularies,
categorization schemes, authority files and other knowledge
organization systems (KOSs) for organizing and standardizing subject
access has increased substantially with the introduction of the Web
and knowledge management initiatives within organizations. As
companies consider the development of KOSs, the extensive investment
required to develop and maintain them becomes apparent. One way to
reduce the investment is to use KOSs that already exist in a variety
of subject areas from architecture to zoology. However, many of
these KOSs are not available on the Internet, or they are not in an
electronic format that allows for easy access to and retrieval of
'pieces' of the vocabulary with its structure intact. This problem
is the focus of the Networked Knowledge Organization
Systems/Services (NKOS) Working Group, an ad hoc group of more than
70 KOS developers and implementers from 10 countries. Beginning with
an initial workshop at the ACM DL 97 Conference, the group has
focused on the standards needed for interoperable, networked KOSs --
metadata for describing KOSs and a protocol for transferring
information from the electronic KOS to the application that will use
it. At a recent meeting held in conjunction with the American
Society for Information Science and Technology Annual Meeting in
Chicago on November 13, members of NKOS focused on a scheme for
marking up a KOS. A draft XML DTD, developed by Joseph Busch and Ron
Daniel of Metacode, Inc. (now part of Interwoven, Inc.) was
presented and reviewed. The schema, called VocML (Vocabulary MarkUp
Language), defines a structure for tagging KOS content to retain the
structure. The DTD allows for Dublin Core metadata that describes
the KOS itself. It also provides tags and syntax for uniquely
identifying each term, its relationship to other terms (using the
standard Z39.19 relationships as well as more detailed types of
associative relationships), and information such as scope notes and
definitions. The goal is to make the DTD as generalized as
possible..." See other references and the draft version 1.0 XML
DTD in "Vocabulary
Markup Language (VocML)."
[December 28, 2000]
WeatherML for the Weather Derivatives Trading Community.
A recent announcement
from the Weather Risk Management Association (WRMA) outlines a
proposed XML-based standard for weather derivatives transactions:
"The Weather Risk Advisory, an independent software and
consulting company specializing in weather derivatives, is leading
an initiative to develop WeatherML, an XML-based data protocol for
electronic processing of weather derivatives. WeatherML will be
developed and promoted on a global basis by the WeatherML Steering
Committee, a group led by Weather Risk Advisory and comprised of key
weather derivatives market players. The committee will include
representatives of each type of organization within the weather
derivatives trading community -- trading organizations, banks,
insurers, reinsurers, and brokers. WeatherML already has the backing
of the majority of players in the weather risk market. WeatherML
will enable organizations to reduce trading costs and operational
risks associated with the use of weather derivative products.
WeatherML will also offer increased flexibility in systems design
and interfacing, and will facilitate enhanced scalability,
particularly as it will not be tied to any operating system or
programming language. Weather Risk Advisory has been working on the
WeatherML concept for the last six months, and Version 1.0 will be
completed in the second quarter of 2001, from which time new interim
releases will be issued approximately quarterly. A proposal has been
made to the industry's trade group, the Weather Risk Management
Association (WRMA), for them to endorse WeatherML. WRMA is active in
promoting the weather derivatives market and developing initiatives
to support it, and it is hoped that the standard can be developed in
partnership with them. Peter Brewer, WeatherML Steering Committee
Chairman and CEO of Weather Risk Advisory, said, 'WeatherML will be
adopted as the industry-wide standard. The wider its adoption, the
greater its value to those involved.' The weather derivatives market
is still in its early stages, allowing the industry to reduce the
costs of the inevitable standardization by developing and adopting
WeatherML while the market itself is developing, and there are still
a limited number of players. Weather Risk Advisory will be working
closely with the creators of other XML standards, such as FpML
(Financial products Markup Language), to ensure compatibility. Jürgen
Gaiser-Porter, WeatherML Standards Committee Chairman and Head of
Research at Weather Risk Advisory said, 'The broad range of players
and the international nature of trading within the weather
derivatives market brings additional challenges in developing
standardized contracts and confirmations. WeatherML will make this
possible, and in doing so will galvanize the weather risk
community.' WeatherML (Weather Markup Language) is a data standard
for electronic processing of weather derivatives. It is XML-based
and is designed to be broadly compatible with other XML data
standards initiatives, such as FpML (Financial products Markup
Language) and those covering reinsurance and energy trading. XML
allows data to be presented in a format readable by both computers
and people." For other description and references, see "Weather
Markup Language (WeatherML)."
[December 23, 2000]
W3C Publishes XML Protocol Requirements Document.
The W3C XML Protocol
Working Group has published a public working draft specification
for XML
Protocol Requirements. Reference: W3C Working Draft
19-December-2000. The document "describes the XML Protocol
Working Group's requirements for the XML Protocol
specification." Revisions from the previous
draft of 7-December-2000 are presented in a color-coded
diff document. As part of the W3C's
Architecture Domain, the W3C XML Protocol Activity is designed
to address the problem of "standardized
application-to-application messaging." According to the activity
statement the XML Protocol Working Group has thus been chartered
"to design four things and to produce a Recommendation based on
them: (1) An envelope to encapsulate XML data for transfer in an
interoperable manner that allows for distributed extensibility,
evolvability, as well as intermediaries like proxies, caches, and
gateways (2) In cooperation with the IETF (Internet Engineering Task
Force), an operating system-neutral convention for the content of
the envelope when used for RPC (Remote Procedure Call) applications
(3) A mechanism to serialize data based on XML Schema datatypes (4)
In cooperation with the IETF, a non-exclusive mechanism layered on
HTTP transport." Included among the general requirements
delineated in the new working draft document: "(1) The
specification will make reasonable efforts to support (but not
define) a broad range of programming models suitable for the
applications intended for XP. (2) The specification will make
reasonable efforts to support (but not define) a broad range of
protocol bindings between communicating peers. (3) The specification
developed by the Working Group must support either directly or via
well defined extension mechanisms different messaging patterns and
scenarios. The specification will directly support One-way and
Request-response patterns as part of permanently and intermittently
connected scenarios. The specification will not preclude the
development of other patterns at either the application or transport
layers. Examples of such patterns may include publish-subscribe or
multicast delivery. All patterns and scenarios will be described by
relevant use cases. (4) The Working Group will coordinate with W3C
XML Activities through the XML Coordination Group and shall use
available XML technologies whenever possible. If there are cases
where this is not possible, the reasons must be documented
thoroughly. (5) The specification developed by the Working Group
shall be as lightweight as possible keeping parts that are mandatory
to the minimum. Optional parts of the specification should be
orthogonal to each other allowing non-conflicting configurations to
be implemented. (6) The specification must be suitable for use
between communicating parties that do not have a priori knowledge of
each other. (7) The specification must focus on the encapsulation
and representation of data being transferred between parties capable
of generating and/or accepting an XP protocol envelope." For
other information, see the XML
Protocol Home Page and "W3C
XML Protocol."
[December 22, 2000]
XML Linking Language (XLink) and XML Base Specifications Issued
as W3C Proposed Recommendations.
On December 20, 2000, the W3C published Proposed Recommendation
specifications for XLink and XML Base. XML
Linking Language (XLink) Version 1.0 [W3C Proposed
Recommendation 20-December-2000] has been edited by Steve
DeRose (Brown University Scholarly Technology Group), Eve
Maler (Sun Microsystems), and David
Orchard. The XLink specification "defines the XML Linking
Language (XLink), which allows elements to be inserted into XML
documents in order to create and describe links between resources.
It uses XML syntax to create structures that can describe links
similar to the simple unidirectional hyperlinks of today's HTML, as
well as more sophisticated links. XLink provides a framework for
creating both basic unidirectional links and more complex linking
structures. It allows XML documents to: (1) Assert linking
relationships among more than two resources; (2) Associate metadata
with a link; (3) Express links that reside in a location separate
from the linked resources... Using XLink potentially involves using
a large number of attributes for supplying important link
information. In cases where the values of the desired XLink
attributes are unchanging across individual instances in all the
documents of a certain type, attribute value defaults (fixed or not)
may be added to a DTD so that the attributes do not have to appear
physically on element start-tags... This specification defines only
attributes and attribute values in the XLink namespace. There is no
restriction on using non-XLink attributes alongside XLink
attributes. In addition, most XLink attributes are optional and the
choice of simple or extended link is up to the markup designer or
document creator, so a DTD that uses XLink features need not use or
declare the entire set of XLink's attributes. Finally, while this
specification identifies the minimum constraints on XLink markup,
DTDs that use XLink are free to tighten these constraints. The use
of XLink does not absolve a valid document from conforming to the
constraints expressed in its governing DTD." The XML
Base specification, edited by Jonathan
Marsh (Microsoft), "proposes a facility similar to that of
HTML BASE for defining base URIs for parts of XML
documents." The review period for both PRs extends until
31-January-2001. For related references, see "XML
Linking Language."
[December 22, 2000]
OASIS Registry and Repository Technical Committee Completes New
Technical Specification.
A new version of the "OASIS
Registry/Repository Technical Specification has been
released. Reference: Working Draft 1.1 December 20, 2000. 152 pages.
This release follows the face-to-face meeting in Washington, DC on
December 5, 2000, and the follow-on teleconference December 15,
2000. 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..."
For related references, see "XML/SGML
Name Registration."
[December 22, 2000]
W3C Releases XHTML Basic Specification as a W3C Recommendation.
The World Wide Web Consortium recently issued an announcement for
the release of XHTML
Basic as a W3C Recommendation: "Continuing its
mission to create one Web for all users, the World Wide Web
Consortium (W3C) today released XHTML Basic as a W3C Recommendation.
The specification reflects cross-industry agreement on a set of
markup language features that allows authors to create rich Web
content deliverable to a wide range of devices, including mobile
phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), pagers, and
television-based Web browsers. A W3C Recommendation indicates that a
specification is stable, contributes to Web interoperability, and
has been reviewed by the W3C Membership, who favor its adoption by
the industry. In January 2000, W3C published the XHTML 1.0
Recommendation, which combined the well-known features of HTML with
the power of XML. In another W3C specification entitled 'Modularization
of XHTML', W3C's HTML Working Group describes a mechanism that
allows authors to mix and match content from well-defined subsets of
XHTML 1.0 elements and attributes. The XHTML Basic Recommendation
combines some of these XHTML modules in a manner well-suited to
mobile Web applications. 'Interoperability has always been essential
to the Web,' said Tim Berners-Lee, W3C Director. 'The simplicity of
early versions of HTML made interoperability easy. While XHTML 1.0
is a powerful language, support for the full XHTML 1.0 feature set
may be too much to expect browsers on cell phones and other small
devices to handle. XHTML Basic offers the simplicity and wide
interoperability of early versions of HTML and reflects ten years of
Web experience, including advances in XML and accessibility.' XHTML
Basic is designed so that it may be implemented by all user agents,
including mobile devices, television-based devices, and other small
Web devices. 'The minimalist nature of the XHTML Basic document type
ensures that all Web clients, including mobile phones, PDAs, pagers,
set-top boxes, and PCs, can support a common subset of XHTML,' said
Dave Raggett, W3C Fellow and Senior Architect at Openwave Systems
Inc. 'XHTML Basic provides a powerful building block for use across
increasingly diverse platforms, and can be extended with various
specialized markup such as for multimedia (SMIL),
mathematics (MathML), vector
graphics (SVG), and
forms (XForms).' The
XHTML Basic specification is the result of significant collaborative
efforts of the W3C HTML Working Group, including participants from
AOL/Netscape; CWI; Ericsson; IBM; Intel; Matsushita Electric
Industrial Co., Ltd.; Microsoft; Mozquito Technologies; Openwave
Systems Inc.; Philips Electronics; Quark Inc.; and Sun Microsystems.
In addition, the Working Group integrated feedback from the W3C
Mobile Access Interest Group and the WAP Forum in an effort to
ensure demonstrable functionality in wireless devices. Many industry
players support, or have plans to support, XHTML Basic, including
the WAP Forum. Today, content developers interested in making XHTML
Basic documents can create them with W3C's own browser/editor, Amaya..."
For other details, see: (1) the testimonials
from industry partners and (2) the full text of the announcement, "World
Wide Web Consortium Issues XHTML Basic as a W3C Recommendation.
XHTML Basic Provides the Key to Full Web Access to Mobile
Devices."
[December 22, 2000]
Extreme 2001 Call for Participation.
Tommie Usdin
(Mulberry Technologies, Inc.) has posted a Call
for Participation in the Extreme 2001 Conference. The conference
will be held August 5-10, 2001 at the Hotel Wyndham, Montréal,
Canada. Extreme Markup Languages 2001 is a "highly technical peer-reviewed
3.7-day conference preceded by two days of tutorials. Subjects
include SGML, XML, Topic Maps, query languages, linking, schemas,
transformations, inference engines, formatting and behavior, and
more. Submissions are due by March 31, 2001. Guidelines for
submission and the DTDs are available on the conference
web site. "There will be four types of presentations at
Extreme 2001: peer reviewed technical papers, late breaking news,
posters, and invited keynotes. All will be new material, address
some aspect of information management from a theoretical or
practical standpoint, and be detailed and rigorous. Come join us to
discuss information alchemy: making documents into information and
data into gold. Extreme Markup Languages brings together software
developers, markup theorists, information visionaries, and other
assorted geeks for formal presentations, poster sessions, question
and answer sessions, hallway discussions, arguments and
gesticulations in front of flip charts, table-top software demos,
coffee, and the cuisine, ambience, and charm of Montréal in August.
Extreme conference participants include thought leaders from
corporate and academic information management, knowledge
engineering, enterprise integration/corporate memory, science, and
technical and cultural research." Contact the
Graphic Communications Association (GCA) for additional
conference information. For other conferences, see the events
calendar.
[December 22, 2000]
evised Working Draft for the W3C XML Information Set.
Paul Grosso (W3C XML
Core Working Group Co-chair) announced
the release of a new working draft specification for the XML
Information Set. Reference: W3C Working Draft
20-December-2000, edited by John Cowan and Richard Tobin. The
specification "provides a set of definitions for use in other
specifications that need to refer to the information in an XML
document." Description: "This technical report defines an
abstract data set called the XML Information Set (Infoset). Its
purpose is to provide a consistent set of definitions for use in
other specifications that need to refer to the information in a
well-formed XML document. It does not attempt to be exhaustive; the
primary criterion for inclusion of an information item or property
has been that of expected usefulness in future specifications. An
XML document has an information set if it is well-formed and
satisfies the namespace constraints described below. There is no
requirement for an XML document to be valid in order to have an
information set. An XML document's information set consists of a
number of information items (the information set for any well-formed
XML document will contain at least a document information item and
several others). An information item is an abstract representation
of some part of an XML document: each information item has a set of
associated properties. The types of information item are listed in
section 2. The XML Information Set does not require or favor a
specific interface or class of interfaces. This specification
presents the information set as a modified tree for the sake of
clarity and simplicity, but there is no requirement that the XML
Information Set be made available through a tree structure; other
types of interfaces, including (but not limited to) event-based and
query-based interfaces are also capable of providing information
conforming to the XML Information Set. As long as the information in
the information set is made available to XML applications in one way
or another, the requirements of this document are satisfied. The
terms 'information set' and 'information item' are similar in
meaning to the generic terms 'tree' and 'node', as they are used in
computing. However, the latter terms were avoided in this document
to reduce possible confusion with other specific data models.
Information items do not map one-to-one with the Nodes of the DOM or
the 'tree' and 'nodes' of the XPath data model.' Document status:
'Though this specification has already had a Last Call review on an
earlier version, in light of the review and much discussion, the XML
Core Working Group has reworked the specification. The WG has
decided (member only) to publish this working draft as representing
its latest work and invites public
comment on this specification." Review comments are publicly
archived. For background, see: (1) the XML
Information Set Requirements document, and (2) the W3C
XML Activity.
[December 15, 2000]
Unicode in XML and other Markup Languages.
W3C and the Unicode Consortium have jointly published the
document Unicode in XML and other Markup Languages,
which "contains guidelines on the use of the Unicode Standard
in conjunction with markup languages such as XML." The document
is published as a W3C
Note [W3C Note 15 December 2000] and as Unicode
Technical Report #20. Principal authors include Martin
Dürst and Asmus Freytag.
The W3C Internationalization Working Group/Interest Group has
contributed to this document in the context of the W3C
Internationalization Activity. The base version of the Unicode
Standard for the document is Version 3.0. Description: "There
are several general points to consider when looking at the
interaction between character encoding and markup. (1) Linearity of
text vs. hierarchy of markup structure; (2) Overlap of
control codes and markup semantics; (3) Coincidence of semantic
markup and functions; (4) Extensibility of markup; (5) Markup vs.
Styling... The Unicode Standard [Unicode] defines the universal
character set. Its primary goal is to provide an unambiguous
encoding of the content of plain text, ultimately covering all
languages in the world. Currently in its third major version,
Unicode contains a large number of characters covering most of the
currently used scripts in the world. It also contains additional
characters for interoperability with older character encodings, and
characters with control-like functions included primarily for
reasons of providing unambiguous interpretation of plain text.
Unicode provides specifications for use of all of these characters.
For document and data interchange, the Internet and the World Wide
Web are more and more making use of marked-up text such as HTML and
XML. In many instances, markup provides the same, or essentially
similar features to those provided by format characters in the
Unicode Standard for use in plain text. Another special character
category provided by Unicode are compatibility characters. While
there may be valid reasons to support these characters and their
specifications in plain text, their use in marked-up text can
conflict with the rules of the markup language. Formatting
characters are discussed in chapters 2 and 3, compatibility
characters in chapter 4. The issues of using Unicode characters with
marked-up text depend to some degree on the rules of the markup
language in question and the set of elements it contains. In a
narrow sense, this document concerns itself only with XML, and to
some extent HTML. However, much of the general information presented
here should be useful in a broader context, including some page
layout languages... Many of the recommendations of this report
depend on the availability of particular markup. Where possible,
appropriate DTDs or Schemas should be used or designed to make such
markup available, or the DTDs or Schemas used should be
appropriately extended. The current version of this document makes
no specific recommendations for the design of DTDs or schemas, or
for the use of particular DTDs or Schemas, but the information
presented here may be useful to designers of DTDs and Schemas, and
to people selecting DTDs or Schemas for their applications. The
recommendations of this report do not apply in the case of XML used
for blind data transport and similar cases." See related
resources in "XML
and Unicode."
[December 15, 2000]
IdooXoap for Java version 1.0.
Jacek Kopecky has announced
the release of IdooXoap for Java version 1.0. IdooXoap is an
"implementation of the SOAP protocol. Using this package you
can easily build clients that can access services described by WSDL
or SCL descriptions, you can also build your own services. IdooXoap
provides the tool for generating WSDL description from Java classes
(Java2WSDL compiler) and also the tool necessary for easy SOAP
development - ServiceCompiler. This one can create service stubs for
you and also generate a skeleton implementation of a service. Major
improvements since pre-betas include: (1) WSDL support; (2) Arrays
support; (3) SOAP Headers support (4) Selective Java to WSDL
compilation; (5) EJB support; (6) Improved interoperability."
See also "Simple
Object Access Protocol (SOAP)."
[December 12, 2000]
Proof-of-Concept Demonstration for the ebXML Technical
Infrastructure.
From a recent industry consortium announcement: "The United
Nations CEFACT and OASIS
today announced that the core technical infrastructure of ebXML,
the Electronic Business XML Initiative, nears completion and will be
delivered in March 2001, two months ahead of schedule. The technical
specifications for the transport, routing and packaging (TRP),
trading partner agreements (TPA), and registry/repository (REG/REP)
components of ebXML provide the required pieces to ensure
interoperability based on XML standards for global business on the
Internet. Enterprises are demanding a standards-based framework for
global trading, and developers are demanding the availability of an
open, business-quality architecture that they can begin evaluating
and implementing now. Progress on the 18-month ebXML initiative has
been so substantial, organizers agreed to move the delivery date
forward to meet this demand. At a recent ebXML meeting in Tokyo,
hundreds of organizations from Asia, Australia, Europe and North
America gathered to advance the development of ebXML. As a highlight
of this meeting and a ratification of this decision, sixteen
companies collaborated in an interactive proof-of-concept
demonstration of the ebXML technical infrastructure. Cisco, Fujistu,
IBM, Interwoven, IPNet, Netfish Technologies, NTT Communications,
Savvion, Sterling Commerce, Sun Microsystems, TIE, Viquity and
XMLSolutions collaborated to build an interactive implementation of
ebXML interoperability. In addition, Extol, webMethods and XML
Global tracked the POC event closely and indicated that they would
be interested in participating in future ebXML events. The
demonstration, which was presented in North America for the first
time today at a media event in San Francisco, showed how businesses
can use ebXML to dynamically formulate trading partnerships through
a registry service and exchange electronic business transactions
using a consistent XML-based messaging infrastructure. The ebXML
demonstration showed dynamic business transactions using payloads
from the Automotive Industry Action Group. 'These vendors, many of
whom are competitors, came together to prove that one of ebXML core
strength's is interoperability', said Robert S. Sutor, Ph.D. of IBM,
vice chair of ebXML and member of the OASIS Board of Directors.
'Early completion of the ebXML technical infrastructure will pave
the way for rapid availability of multiple commercial integrated
ebXML-compliant solutions. These will reduce the costs of deployment
and ensure the flexibility required for e-commerce success in the
global market'." See (1) the full text of the announcement "United
Nations CEFACT and OASIS to Deliver ebXML Technical Infrastructure
Ahead of Schedule. Proof-of-Concept Demo with Thirteen Vendors
Proves Readiness of Electronic Business Infrastructure.",
and (2) "Electronic
Business XML Initiative (ebXML)."
[December 12, 2000]
BizTalk Framework 2.0 Final Version Published.
Microsoft has announced
the publication of the "final version of its BizTalk
Framework 2.0 specification, which is now available for download.
Based on industry standards for data exchange and security such as
SOAP 1.1 (Simple Object Access Protocol), XML and S/MIME, the
BizTalk Framework enables the secure and reliable exchange of
business documents over the Internet. Development of the BizTalk
Framework is overseen by the BizTalk Steering Committee, which
comprises industry partners, consortiums and standards bodies."
The published specification offers a general overview of the BizTalk
Framework 2.0 conceptual architecture, including the BizTalk
Document and BizTalk Message. It provides detailed specifications
for the construction of BizTalk Documents and Messages, and their
secure transport over a number of Internet-standard transport and
transfer protocols. Background: "Extensible Markup Language
(XML) and XML-based schema languages provide a strong set of
technologies with a low barrier to entry. These languages enable one
to describe and exchange structured information between
collaborating applications or business partners in a platform- and
middleware-neutral manner. As a result, domain-specific standards
bodies and industry initiatives have started to adopt XML and
XML-based schema languages to specify both their vocabularies and
content models. These schemas are becoming widely published and
implemented to facilitate communication between both applications
and businesses. Wide support of XML has also resulted in independent
solution providers developing solutions that enable the exchange of
XML-based information with other third-party or custom-developed
applications. Several solution- or middleware/platform-specific
approaches have been taken to address the lack of
middleware-neutral, application-level communication protocols.
However, no single proprietary solution or middleware platform meets
all the needs of a complex deployment environment. These proprietary
initiatives have generally resulted in customers facing broad
interoperability issues on their own. The BizTalk Framework
addresses these interoperability challenges in a platform- and
technology-neutral manner. It provides specifications for the design
and development of XML-based messaging solutions for communication
between applications and organizations. This specification builds
upon standard and emerging Internet technologies such as Hypertext
Transfer Protocol (HTTP), Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions
(MIME), Extensible Markup Language (XML), and Simple Object Access
Protocol (SOAP). Subsequent versions of the BizTalk Framework will
be enhanced to make use of additional XML and Internet-related,
messaging-standards work as appropriate. It is important to note
that the BizTalk Framework does not attempt to address all aspects
of business-to-business electronic commerce. For instance, it does
not deal directly with legal issues, agreements regarding
arbitration, or recovery from catastrophic failures, nor does it
specify specific business processes such as those for purchasing or
securities trading. The BizTalk Framework provides a set of basic
mechanisms required for most business-to-business electronic
exchanges. It is expected that other specifications and standards,
consistent with the BizTalk Framework, will be developed for the
application- and domain-specific aspects."
[December 12, 2000]
W3C Publishes XSL Transformations (XSLT) Version 1.1.
W3C has released an XSLT revision in a working draft document XSL
Transformations (XSLT) Version 1.1. Reference: W3C
Working Draft 12-December-2000, edited by James
Clark. An HTML
version with color-coded revision indicators has been prepared
to reveal changes vis-à-vis the W3C Recommendation of
1999-11-16. The non-normative Appendix G supplies a listing of
"Changes from XSLT 1.0." Appendix D provides a "DTD
Fragment for XSLT Stylesheets." Document abstract: "This
specification defines the syntax and semantics of XSLT, which is a
language for transforming XML documents into other XML documents.
XSLT is designed for use as part of XSL, which is a stylesheet
language for XML. In addition to XSLT, XSL includes an XML
vocabulary for specifying formatting. XSL specifies the styling of
an XML document by using XSLT to describe how the document is
transformed into another XML document that uses the formatting
vocabulary. XSLT is also designed to be used independently of XSL.
However, XSLT is not intended as a completely general-purpose XML
transformation language. Rather it is designed primarily for the
kinds of transformations that are needed when XSLT is used as part
of XSL." Document status: "The working draft is based on
the W3C XSLT
1.0 Recommendation. The changes made in this document are
intended to meet the requirements
for XSLT 1.1 and to incorporate fixes for errors
that have been detected in XSLT 1.0." For related information,
see (1) the W3C Style
Activity and (2) "Extensible
Stylesheet Language (XSL/XSLT)."
[December 12, 2000]
Updated W3C Candidate Recommendation for Canonical XML.
The W3C's Candidate Recommendation for Canonical
XML Version 1.0 has been updated in light of reviewers'
comments in the current implementation phase. Reference: W3C
Candidate Recommendation 12-December-2000, edited by John
Boyer (PureEdge Solutions Inc.). Document abstract: "Any
XML document is part of a set of XML documents that are logically
equivalent within an application context, but which vary in physical
representation based on syntactic changes permitted by XML 1.0 and Namespaces
in XML. This specification describes a method for generating a
physical representation, the canonical form, of an XML document that
accounts for the permissible changes. Except for limitations
regarding a few unusual cases, if two documents have the same
canonical form, then the two documents are logically equivalent
within the given application context. Note that two documents may
have differing canonical forms yet still be equivalent in a given
context based on application-specific equivalence rules for which no
generalized XML specification could account." Document status:
"This revised Candidate Recommendation of the IETF/W3C
XML Signature Working Group includes three clarifications
resulting from comments made during the four week call for
implementation, which formally ended November 24, 2000. The XML
Signature Working Group believes this specification incorporates the
resolution of all last call and call for implementation issues;
furthermore it considers the specification to be very stable, as
demonstrated by its interoperability
report. We hope to refer this document to the W3C Director for
consideration as Proposed Recommendation in early January,
2001."
[December 12, 2000]
SOAP Messages with Attachments.
The W3C has acknowledged
receipt of a submission from Commerce One, Inc., Hewlett Packard
Company, International Business Machines Corporation, IONA
Technologies, Microsoft Corporation, Oracle Corporation and
webMethods, Inc. on SOAP 1.1 message binding for transmission within
a MIME multipart/related message: SOAP
Messages with Attachments. Reference: W3C Note
11-December-2000, by John J. Barton (Hewlett Packard Labs), Satish
Thatte (Microsoft), and Henrik Frystyk Nielsen (Microsoft). The
document abstract: "This document defines a binding for a SOAP
1.1 message to be carried within a MIME multipart/related message in
such a way that the processing rules for the SOAP 1.1 message are
preserved. The MIME multipart mechanism for encapsulation of
compound documents can be used to bundle entities related to the
SOAP 1.1 message such as attachments. Rules for the usage of URI
references to refer to entities bundled within the MIME package are
specified." The NOTE submission constitutes a suggestion for
message packaging for the W3C
XML Activity on XML Protocols. Description: "A SOAP message
may need to be transmitted together with attachments of various
sorts, ranging from facsimile images of legal documents to
engineering drawings. Such data are often in some binary format. For
example, most images on the Internet are transmitted using either
GIF or JPEG data formats. In this document we describe a standard
way to associate a SOAP message with one or more attachments in
their native format in a multipart MIME structure for transport. The
specification combines specific usage of the Multipart/Related MIME
media type (RFC 2387) and the URI schemes discussed in RFC 2111 and
RFC2557 for referencing MIME parts. The methods described here treat
the multipart MIME structure as essentially a part of the transfer
protocol binding, i.e., on par with the transfer protocol headers as
far as the SOAP message is concerned. The multipart structure,
though given a name (SOAP message package) is not an entity that can
be unambiguously identified as such because there is no token
explicitly expressing the intent to make it such an entity. A
conscious choice in this document was to avoid adding a new entity
type based on a recognizable token. The purpose of this document is
to show how to use existing facilities in SOAP and standard MIME
mechanisms to carry and reference attachments. In other words, we
take a minimalist approach to show what is already possible with
existing standards without inventing anything. More rigorous
semantics for message packages requires a new entity type. Such a
type can be built by extending the approach described here with a
new SOAP header entry which, for instance, may be used to provide a
manifest of the complete contents of the message package."
Rationale: "The co-submitters of this specification believe
strongly that this specification provides important functionality
that allows a SOAP message to be transferred in a MIME multipart
wrapper along with so-called attachments of any media type supported
by MIME without changing any of the existing specifications
referenced. Especially, it does not require any changes to the
SOAP/1.1 W3C Note. Because of the earlier SOAP/1.1 submission, the
W3C is well suited to co-ordinate work in this area. The W3C member
companies submitting this document suggest that the Consortium
include this submission as consideration in the XML Protocol
Activity although not necessarily within the existing XML Protocol
Working Group." The W3C staff
comment says, in part: "Direct handling of binary data has
been considered as a low priority for this Working Group. Reusing a
similar, MIME-based, solution could be a low-cost option for the XML
Protocol Working Group. The XML Protocol Working Group will
determine whether, when, or how to incorporate this submission in
their work." See related references in "Simple
Object Access Protocol (SOAP)."
[December 11, 2000]
The Active Digital Profile Initiative.
Led by Business Layers,
several companies have formed the Active Digital Profile Initiative,
designed to "standardize interfaces and methodologies used to
provision digital resources that span devices, applications and
services within the enterprise and between enterprises."
Background to the initiative is the "complex supply chain...
companies must provision voice and data network resources, security
systems, remote access systems, operating systems, applications,
Web-based information services -- in addition to services that are
outsourced to traditional outsourcers or ASPs." The
initiative's response is the Active Digital Profile (ADPr) --
"a proposed open XML-based specification that will allow
companies to share provisioning information across multi-vendor
systems. When fully adopted and deployed, an enterprise will be able
to hire a new employee or invite a new business partner to share
their network resources knowing that everything that person needs to
be productive will simply and automatically be delivered to the
right person at the right time. The initiative invites anyone
interested in expanding the scope of their provisioning solutions to
join its effort to bring openness and interoperability to the
eProvisioning process... The ADPr is an XML-based specification that
supports any application, in any scenario. The ADPr is an
eProvisioning specification, not a network management specification.
It is designed to handle the adds, moves, changes, and deletion of
users associated with a broad range of services or resources, across
the extended enterprise. The specification defines a document that
will include a header containing authentication and authorization
information, a context used to identify the user and all bounding
conditions such as contracts, SLAs, organizations, domains, etc.,
and one or more tasks and the associated data that is valid within
the scope defined by the context... Based on Business Layers'
advanced eProvisioning software, used by customers around the world,
the ADPr specification has already undergone significant
development. Business Layers will continue to work with various
industry leaders to refine the new specification and submit it to
OASIS, the Organization for the Advancement of Structured
Information Standards." A draft specification containing the
XML DTD is available on the Active
Digital Profile Web site. For other description and references,
see: (1) the announcement "Business
Layers Leads Effort to Develop First XML-Based eProvisioning
Specification. Check Point Software Technologies, ePresence, Netigy,
Novell and Other Leading Companies Applaud Proposed Active Digital
Profile (ADPr) Specification.", and (2) "Active
Digital Profile."
[December 09, 2000]
Triple-s XML Survey Interchange Standard.
Triple-s is an XML-based "open survey interchange
standard" for the encoding and interchange of survey data
collected and analyzed by social science professionals. The standard
"defines a means by which both survey data and meta-data
(variables) may be transferred between different survey programs
running on different software and hardware platforms." The
domain problem is typical: "Increasingly, users of survey
software are demanding that data be exchangeable between survey
software systems from different vendors and possibly running on
different hardware and/or different operating system platforms. The
transfer may be required because an client wants to perform some
more detailed analysis of aspects of a survey originally conducted
by an agency and the two parties use different survey software. The
initial version of the triple-s standard (version 1.0) was devised
by Keith Hughes, Stephen Jenkins and Geoff Wright, and published in
1994. The impetus was a paper by Peter Wills. During 1996 the same
group of people met to enhance and extend the standard, based on
comments from implementers and users. An interim result of these
meetings was presented as a paper to the ASC (Association for Survey
Computing) International Conference in 1996. The preliminary
specification for version 1.1 of the triple-s standard was agreed in
December 1996 and published in March 1998." Thus, triple-s has
been designed "as an interchange format; it was not conceived
as a native survey definition format, nor is it a replacement for
the many proprietary survey definition languages currently in use.
The triple-s XML format provides for the cross-platform transfer of
both survey data and survey variables using universal industry
standard protocols. The syntax of a triple-s XML document is
described by the freely available triple-s DTD. triple-s XML
provides for the description of the five most common types of
variable: (1) SINGLE variables interpret categorical data with one
response allowed; (2) MULTIPLE variables interpret categorical data
with any number of responses allowed; (3) QUANTITY variables
interpret open numeric value (integer or real); (4) CHARACTER
variables interpret character data; (5) LOGICAL variables interpret
individual Yes/No or True/False data values. triple-s XML allows for
both integer and real coded values to be represented. Two formats
for the representation of multi-response data are supported. Where
standard coding has been used to represent special values -- for
example, where '9' is used to represent 'Not Answered' -- that
coding is maintained through the transfer operation rather than
being closed down on a question by question basis. Furthermore, the
fact that a particular code is 'special' in some way can be
represented and thus indicated to a survey importer. A triple-s
survey is described in two text files. One, the Definition File,
contains version and general information about the survey together
with definitions of the survey variables. This is used to interpret
the contents of the Data file..." For description and
references, see: (1) the Triple-s
Home Page, and (2) "Triple-s
XML Survey Interchange Standard."
[December 09, 2000]
CaveScript XML for Speleologists.
CaveScript
XML, being developed by Michael
Lake, is "the generic name of a cave survey and map data
format that could store all the information about a cave survey or
an entire cave map. It is designed to assist speleologists and
cavers in cave surveying and drawing up cave maps. CaveScript XML
consists of a suite of utility programs, a specification for a Cave
Survey Markup Language and some Document Type Definitions for the
language. The two principal DTDs are CaveSurvey.dtd
and the CaveMap.dtd.
These form the foundations for the CaveScript Mapping Program which
can generate Postscript files showing survey legs and cave features
such as the walls, avens etc. If later the survey data changes,
because errors are fixed or loops closed, the mapping program will
automatically modify the wall detail to 'refit' the changed survey
legs. CaveView
is the CaveMap XML to Postscript Converter; it is a Perl script that
reads a CaveMap XML file and creates a Postscript file for printing
the cave map. The programs still need lots of code and a GUI
frontend. The GUI part will probably be written using GTK. The
CaveScript markup language developed for the project is based on
XML. CaveScript is released under the GNU General Public License...
CaveScript is still just a draft of a new language for cave survey
data. Its goal is to provide a data format to store information
about a cave and its map and CaveScript won't be a data reduction
engine. Survex is excellent for that and so the need to have scripts
so that I can convert my XML data to Survex
[a free open-source cave survey tool with a powerful heirarchical
file system for station naming]." The Document Type Definitions
for the CaveScript XML, documentation, and example XML files are
available for download.
Also available
are programs, examples and documentation for the Perl scripts which
convert Survex to XML (svx2xml) and XML to Survex (xml2svx), and
sources for CaveView.
[December 07, 2000]
US Patent and Trademark Office Deploys XML Solutions for
Electronic Filing.
The US Patent and Trademark Office "is one of the world's
largest Intellectual Property Offices, now processing in excess of
400,000 patent and trademark applications and in excess of 1,600,000
transactions in connection with these applications in 1999."
According to recent publications in government journals and a USPTO
'Request for Agreement' (RFA RFA Solicitation No.: 60-PBPT-0-00001,
2000-10-03), efforts are now underway to develop and deploy
XML-based solutions for USPTO electronic filings. An attachment
to the recent RFA supplies a 'List of Trademark, Patent, and
Assignment DTDs' which are in development or use in the PTO's
electronic filing initiatives. The USPTO "has based its
electronic filing and business communication initiatives on
Extensible Markup Language (XML)-tagged documents and has developed
standard formats for applications and most applicant/USPTO
correspondence received and sent by the USPTO during the prosecution
of a patent as well as post grant correspondence. Similarly, the
USPTO has developed XML DTDs for trademark applications and for
required post application and post registration filings. At this
time some 23 patent related and 8 trademark XML documents have been
defined of which a smaller number have been validated through use.
The focus of this USPTO program is to encourage COTS IP software
management companies to include the ability to produce the XML
encoded application documents compliant with the USPTO DTDs as part
of, or as an extension to, existing software products." SGML
DTDs defined in the Grant
Red Book Specification for SGML Markup of United States Patent Grant
Publications have been in use for some time; the reference
document also contains links for (1) the "Application Red Book:
Specification for SGML Markup of United States Patent Application
Publications" and for (2) "Electronic Filing System
DTDs." USPTO plans call for the use of SGML through 2001,
followed by complete transition to XML DTDs in 2002. The Grant
Red Book DTD V2.4 issued 10/17/2000 reflects changes made in the
DTD ('st32-us-grant-024nf.dtd') for compatibility with XML. A USPTO
Electronic Filing System (EFS) already supports secure electronic
filing of Patent application. "EFS provides Patent applicants
and practitioners with software capabilities and technical guidance
to electronically author Patent application information for
submission to the USPTO via the Internet. EFS is comprised of two
software components: (1) authoring software that complies with USPTO
business rules and electronic data capture standards; and (2)
submission software that validates bundles, compresses, and securely
submits the electronic application files and information. USPTO
makes available at no cost authoring and submission software. To
author your specification document one may use the preferred
Authoring tool known as PASAT (Patent Application Specification
Authoring Tool)... The submission software is called the electronic
Packaging and Validation Engine, or ePAVE. The submission software
after successful transmission, returns an acknowledgement receipt
that includes the date of receipt at the USPTO and an assigned
Patent application number. EFS implements Patent business rules and
practices using Internet technologies. The Extensible Markup
Language (XML) is one technical standard implemented. Applicants
author their Patent application specifications off-line as
intelligent, tagged, electronic documents using XML. Using ePAVE
applicants author other patent application information as XML
'forms'. The Extensible Markup Language is a non-proprietary
standard approved by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). XML is a
format used for exchange of information between different
applications as well as for publishing information. USPTO EFS
software automatically tags the patent application specification and
other related application information." For description and
references, see "US
Patent and Trademark Office Electronic Filing System."
[December 07, 2000]
SyncML Initiative Publishes SyncML 1.0 Specification.
Founders of The SyncML
Initiative, including Ericsson, IBM, Lotus, Matsushita,
Motorola, Nokia, Palm, Inc., Psion, and Starfish hosted a briefing
today in connection with the release of the SyncML 1.0
specification. Douglas Heintzman, Chairman of SyncML, hosted the
teleconference call with other SyncML founders. The SyncML
Initiative "develops and promotes an open industry
specification for universal data synchronization of remote data and
personal information across multiple networks, platforms and
devices. SyncML is a XML-based data synchronization protocol
designed to create the optimal mobile computing experience by
supporting enhanced data synchronization, including e-mail,
calendar, contact management information, enterprise data stored in
databases, Web-based documents and new forms of content from systems
available in the future." Several XML DTDs and related
specifications documents (e.g., SyncML
Synchronisation Protocol Specification V1.0 and SyncML
Representation Protocol Specification V1.0) are now
available for download.
From the announcement: "SyncML, the initiative sponsored by
Ericsson, IBM, Lotus, Matsushita, Motorola, Nokia, Palm, Inc., Psion
and Starfish Software, has today released the SyncML 1.0
specification providing tomorrow's synchronization technology for
today's mobile solutions. In less than one year, SyncML has
successfully developed and published a powerful protocol for
universal data synchronization of both remote and local data. In
addition to the specification, SyncML
initiative also released a SyncML Reference Toolkit source code,
enabling companies to rapidly bring SyncML-compliant products to the
market. 'The SyncML initiative is proud to deliver this exciting
technology to the market in record-breaking time. Full
interoperability among mobile terminals and server infrastructures
is a fundamental ingredient in the successful deployment of mobile
Internet services. The entire industry will greatly benefit from the
success of SyncML,' said Ilari Nurmi, vice chairman of the SyncML
initiative. SyncML-enabled products and services will offer
consumers mobile freedom by synchronizing personal data and
providing interoperability among all SyncML-compliant products and
services. Consumers and business professionals alike will be able to
synchronize their personal data, such as contacts and calendars, in
mobile terminals with various applications and services including
corporate personal information managers, Internet calendars,
Internet address books and more. Synchronization will be possible
locally and remotely through various transports, such as infrared,
Bluetooth, HTTP and WAP, regardless of platform or manufacturer.
This open standard will enable device manufacturers, application
developers, Internet companies, and wireless operators to have
SyncML-compliant products and services commercially available as
early as the Q1 2001. Founded in February 2000, the SyncML
initiative has recognized the growing need for a single data
synchronization protocol. With the industry-wide proliferation of
mobile devices and the evolution of these devices as the major means
of information exchange, synchronization of data will be of integral
importance. The SyncML initiative, officially supported by more
than 500 device manufacturers, service providers and application
developers, welcomes new supporters to join the initiative. New
members have the opportunity to make contributions to the
specification work and will receive advanced solution development
tools provided by the SyncML initiative." In this connection, Nokia
"showcased the
world's first SyncML implementation with the Nokia 9210
Communicator. The demonstration also included a powerful SyncML
enabled Internet calendar solution, the Nokia Mobile Calendar, which
in addition to SyncML supports legacy mobile phones too. The Nokia
Mobile Calendar is a product, which operators and Internet service
providers can offer to their subscribers." See description and
references in "The
SyncML Initiative."
[December 07, 2000]
miniXML Parser with Source Code.
In the January
2001 issue of Dr. Dobb's
Journal, Xerox researcher David
Cox 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."
[December 07, 2000]
Squish RDF Query Tool Released.
Libby Miller has
posted an announcement
for an alpha release and demonstration of 'Squish'
- a Java tool for processing complex RDF queries. "Squish is
demonstration software written in Java for making complex queries of
RDF on top of Java RDF APIs such as Jena
and the Stanford
RDF API. The SQL-like query language it uses is similar in some
aspects to that used by R.V.
Guha's rdfDB, and allows you to make complex queries of RDF
models instead of navigating incrementally around them. Squish also
uses the JDBC API to make RDF querying easier over RDF stored in SQL
databases (Postgres) or in in-memory models. The distribution
includes the Java servlet runner Tomcat,
and sample JSPs for querying RDF databases using JDBC, including a
JSP which allows you to generate and display RSS 1.0 channels. This
implementation is intended to demonstrate the possibilities of this
approach, and is only appropriate for extremely small scale use.
Comments are very welcome." For related tools, see "Resource
Description Framework (RDF)." [12-Dec-2000 update: "a
few minor bug fixes, improvements to the generation and display of
RSS 1.0 files, and migration to SiRPAC 1.15"; see the eGroups
mailing list for announcements, and the alternate URL, http://rdf.desire.org/~cmlm/rdfquery/.]
[December 06, 2000]
Microsoft Releases XML for Analysis Specification.
Microsoft recently announced an 'XML for Analysis Specification'
as a protocol for extending business intelligence to Web Services.
This specification is now available for download
from the Universal Data
Access Web Site. It is open for public
feedback from 10/30/00 to 1/15/01; an updated specification will
be posted approximately 1/30/01. From the text of the press release:
"Microsoft Corporation
today announced the release of the beta specification for XML for
Analysis -- a new protocol that extends the Microsoft business
intelligence strategy to the Microsoft
.NET vision of Web services, allowing application developers to
provide analytic capabilities to any client on any device or
platform using any programming language. Built on HTTP, XML and SOAP
and with more than 50 industry players having been instrumental in
its development, XML for Analysis is being hailed by developers of
analytical tools as the first cross-platform solution designed to
address the unique challenges of analytical data access and
manipulation. As an extension to OLE DB for OLAP and OLE DB for Data
Mining, XML for Analysis uses the Internet as the platform for
building analytical applications from diverse sources of data, thus
enabling developers to provide better Web services for analytic
data. Corporations can now allow trading partners, customers and
suppliers to access data easily and securely over the Web without
worrying about client operating system, application language or
middleware compatibility issues. XML for Analysis expands access to
business intelligence by increasing the flexibility for developers
to incorporate analytical data within applications that reside
remotely on the Internet, or even those that are hosted by another
company. Users can achieve a new level of pervasive data analysis
because they have access to data from any client ranging from a PDA
to an Internet-enabled phone, interactive TV device, laptop computer
or PC. XML for Analysis is a fully compatible advancement to the OLE
DB for OLAP and OLE DB for Data Mining protocols. Thousands of
applications developers, representing hundreds of third-party
products currently using the existing OLE DB for OLAP and OLE DB for
Data Mining standards, can quickly and easily upgrade to XML for
Analysis. Over 100 developers and architects from more than 50
companies were involved in the review process of the XML for
Analysis specification. These include Adaytum Inc., AlphaBlox Corp.,
Andersen Consulting, ANGOSS, Brio Technology Inc., Broadbase
Software, Business Objects, Cognos Corp., Knosys Inc., Maximal
Software Inc., PricewaterhouseCoopers, SAP Americas Inc., SAS
Institute Inc., Seagate Software, SPSS Inc., Symmetry and Walker
Interactive Systems Inc. Developer feedback was captured during a
preview event held at the Microsoft campus in late October and via a
newsgroup facility... 'Web-based services for e-business are
definitely on the rise, and -- in terms of business intelligence --
this means accessing analytic databases hosted over the Internet,'
said Philip Russom, research director of business intelligence at
Hurwitz Group. 'Microsoft's XML for Analysis addresses this need
with a protocol that's based on Internet standards and optimized for
interaction with Web services. Unlike newer attempts at a standard
protocol, XML for Analysis is based on OLE DB for OLAP, which has
seen almost three years of industry review, IT implementation and
support by third-party analytic software. And it's not just for
OLAP; XML for Analysis also supports Web-based data mining'."
For other details, see the full text of the announcement: "Microsoft
Offers XML-Based Protocol for Extending Business Intelligence to Web
Services. Industry Rallies Around Platform-Independent XML for
Analysis Specification."
[December 06, 2000]
Program Announced for XML DevCon Europe Conference Spring 2001.
Ken North has
posted an announcement
with the program listing for the XML DevCon Europe Conference in
London. "The XML
DevCon Europe Spring 2001 Conference runs from February 21-23,
2001 at the Novotel London West Hotel and Convention Centre. The
conference has an enterprise XML focus with four tracks of classes
that cover developer techniques, applied XML, middleware, servers,
and databases. There is also a Lagniappe track with sessions about
Web Services, wireless technologies, business-to-business (B2B)
integration, Java programming, and other topics. Program highlights
includes a keynote address by W3C Fellow Henry Thompson, a keynote
panel discussion, and hands-on workshops. Participants in the
keynote panel discussion include Paul Brown, Martin Bryan, Simon
Nicholson, David Orchard, Sebastian Rahtz, and Henry Thompson. The
workshops are hands-on reviews of schemas and stylesheets, including
those submitted by the public prior to the conference. The
Stylesheets and Transformations Workshop will be presented by Bob
DuCharme, G. Ken Holman, and Sebastian Rahtz. The XML Schema
Workshop will be presented by Henry Thompson, Michael Rys, and
Priscilla Walmsley. The technical program offers dozens of other
sessions of interest to serious XML developers." For other XML
conferences, see the events
calendar.
[December 05, 2000]
XML Topic Maps (XTM) Specification Featured in the GCA's Topic
Map Special Interest Day.
The new XTM (XML Topic Maps) Specification was featured in the
December 5th, 2000 "Topic
Map Special Interest Day" at XML 2000. XTM Co-chairs Michel
Biezunski and Steven R. Newcomb presented the new specification, and
members of the XTM Working Group provided a walk-through. XTM
represents an XML grammar for interchanging Web-based Topic Maps,
currently under development by the Topicmaps.Org
Authoring Group. The working group has announced the public
release of three principal XML specifications documents, along with
other supporting resources. (1) XML
Topic Maps (XTM) 1.0 Core Deliverables [XTM-Core]
represents "portions of the XTM 1.0 Specification that are not
subject to any future change that would invalidate any XTM document
or XTM application that conforms to the syntactic and other
constraints [...] are intended to impose in order to guarantee
reliable interchange of Web-based topic map information in
XML." This includes the XTM 1.0 DTD, the XTM 1.0 Published
Subject Indicators (an XTM topic map), and the XTM 1.0 Conformance
clause. "This specification provides a grammar for representing
the structure of information resources used to define topics, and
the associations (relationships) between topics. Names, resources,
and relationships are said to be characteristics of abstract
subjects, which are called topics. Topics have their
characteristics within scopes: i.e., the limited
contexts within which the names and resources are regarded as their
name, resource, and relationship characteristics. One or more
interrelated documents employing this grammar is called a 'topic
map'." (2) XML
Topic Maps (XTM) 1.0. TopicMaps.Org AG Review Specification
[XTM] describes version 1.0 of XML Topic Maps, an XML grammar for
interchanging Web-based topic maps. "This document is in the
Authoring Group Review phase of development. Except for specific
parts that appear in Core Deliverables, the contents of this
document represent portions of the XTM 1.0 Specification that are
subject to changes made in the course of an Authoring Group (AG)
Review process." Annex B provides the XTM Conceptual Model; the
diagrams are 'class diagrams' and 'object diagrams' that use the
conventions of the Unified Modeling Language (UML). Annex C provides
the XTM 1.0 Document Type Declaration; Annex D presents XTM 1.0
Published Subject Indicators; in addition to the XTM
Published Subject Indicators topic map, XTM topic maps for natural
language and country
(e.g., for use in topic map internationalization), are
provided. Annex E provides a link to information describing the
transformation of topic map documents conforming to ISO 13250 into
XTM 1.0 syntax: ISO
13250 to XTM 1.0 Document Transformation 1.0. (3) XML
Topic Maps (XTM) Processing Model 1.0 [XTMP] describes
version 1.0 of XML Topic Maps (XTM) Processing Model 1.0, a
processing model for XTM. The document provides a description of the
processing model bridging the gap between the XTM abstract
conceptual model and the XTM interchange syntax. This document is in
the Authoring Group Review phase of development. Except for specific
parts that appear in Core Deliverables, "the contents of this
document represent portions of the XTM 1.0 Specification that are
subject to changes made in the course of an Authoring Group (AG)
Review process." TopicMaps.Org is an independent consortium of
parties developing the applicability of the Topic Map paradigm [ISO13250]
to the World Wide Web by leveraging the XML family of
specifications. For other references, see: (1) the
XTM web site; (2) the XTM resource listing in Murray Altheim's
posting "Final
Release of XTM 1.0 Specifications"; (3) the announcement
from Michel Biezunski; (4) the
'doctypes.org' XTM
repository home page; (5) "(XML)
Topic Maps."
[December 05, 2000]
SemanText for Topic Maps and Semantic Networks.
Eric Freese (ISOGEN
International/DataChannel) posted an announcement
for the version 0.71 release of SemanText, an open source Topic Map
application which can be downloaded from the SemanText web
site. SemanText is "a prototype application developed to
demonstrate how the topic map standard (ISO/IEC
13250:2000) can be used to represent semantic networks.
Semantic networks are a building block for artificial intelligence
applications such as inference engines and expert systems. SemanText
builds a knowledge base, in the form of a semantic network, from the
topic map. New information can be added to the knowledge base and
topic map automatically when the user defines rules which are used
to infer new knowledge. All of this is done using constructs defined
in the topic map standard. The benefit of this is that the new
knowledge is then interchangeable with any other topic map enabled
system. As more and more topic map enabled applications are
developed, the ability to share, interpret, and create new knowledge
will be greatly increased. SemanText is written in Python which
means that it is platform independent. It uses many existing tools
such as the wxPython GUI library, the PyXML libraries, and the tmproc
topic map processor. Its user interface provides a simple, intuitive
mechanism for working with the topic map information. SemanText uses
the constructs defined in the topic map standard to model the
knowledge processed and managed by the system. Topics and topic
types are used to represent the nodes within the semantic network.
The topics and topic types also form a class-instance hierarchy
which allows SemanText to infer knowledge about specific topics
based on their types. Associations are used to represent the links
between the topics. Semantics are attached to the associations which
allow the inference engine to build upon the internal knowledge
base. Facets are used to store metadata about the topics within the
knowledge base. Occurrences, which are not yet implemented, will
provide background or source information about the associations and
topics within the knowledge base. Scopes and themes are also not
implemented currently, but will be used to limit the applicability
of certain pieces of knowledge. The power of scoping will allow the
inference engine to make inferences based on knowledge which is
relevant to a certain set of conditions. SemanText's inference
engine allows the user to define and use rules which are then
applied to the knowledge base to develop new knowledge based on the
relationships between the topics. This 'learning' mode can be
switched on and off, in order to minimize impact on the system when
the rules are being processed. When learning is activated, any new
additions to the knowledge base are immediately examined to
determine if they can be used to provide new knowledge to the
knowledge base. In the near future, the rules themselves will be
stored and managed using topic map constructs. This provides a
method for interchanging the inferencing rules in a standard
way..." For related resources, see: (1) "(XML)
Topic Maps" and (2) "XML
and 'The Semantic Web'."
[December 05, 2000]
dbXML Core Edition Released With Enhanced XPath Query Support.
A posting from Kimbro
Staken (Chief Technology Officer, dbXML Group L.L.C) announces
the release of dbXML Core Edition version 0.4. "The dbXML Group
is proud to announce the release of version 0.4 of the dbXML Core
Edition. The dbXML Core Edition is the world's first Open Source
native XML database application server. It is a data management
system designed specifically for collections of XML documents and is
easily embedded into existing applications, highly configurable, and
openly extensible. The source code has been released under the GNU
Lesser General Public License and is available at the dbXML
Group's Core Edition web page. This release updates the dbXML
distribution adding new features bug fixes and better documentation.
New features added in this release include: (1) Completed Compressed
DOM implementation. (2) Indexing system enhancements to allow
explicit index creation for XPath queries. (3) Integration of the
Cocoon XSL-T engine into the core server to enable internal
transformation of XML data. (4) Enhanced XMLObject Architecture to
provide robust server side embedded logic. (5) Nested Collection
support for improved storage layout efficiency. The dbXML Core
Edition is available for download.
The dbXML Group focuses on next-generation web application
development tools and services specifically in the realm of
XML-related technologies." See related resources in "XML
and Databases."
[December 05, 2000]
Open Source NewsML Toolkit for Processing NewsML Packages.
A communiqué
from David Megginson
reports on the release of a news toolkit, announced on 2000-12-05 by
Reuters and Wavo at the XML 2000 Conference. "Reuters and Wavo
will announce version 0.1alpha of the NewsML Toolkit, an Open Source
(LGPL) Java2-based library for processing NewsML packages. The
library is available at www.xmlnews.org/NewsML/toolkit/
and at the
Reuters web site. NewsML is the new XML-based packaging and
metadata format for news distribution, approved this fall by the
International Press Telecommunications Council (IPTC). The IPTC's
membership includes many of the world's major news providers, such
as Reuters, the Associated Press, and Agence France Presse, as well
as many other companies working in the news industry. For more
information see www.iptc.org. The
NewsML Toolkit was written for Reuters and Wavo by David Megginson
of Megginson Technologies.
The library is a joint project of Reuters
PLC, a leading international information services provider, and Wavo,
a leading news amalgamator. The NewsML Toolkit works with the
Document Object Model (DOM) interface developed by the World Wide
Web Consortium (W3C)." The toolkit "provides a simple
interface that lets you perform the most important NewsML processing
tasks without any knowledge of XML or the intricacies of NewsML
markup. Java developers with no prior XML knowledge can use the
NewsML Toolkit to extract many kinds of information from a
multimedia NewsML package, including news lines, permissions, dates,
whether a story is embargoed, and where to find the individual news
objects, all using regular Java object methods. While the initial
NewsML Toolkit release concentrates on presenting the most important
information as simply as possible, the full XML markup is always
available through the DOM whenever needed. The initial release of
the NewsML Toolkit comes bundled with a simple demonstration
application, the NewsML Explorer for browsing NewsML packages. The
NewsML Explorer requires the Apache
Xerces-Java XML library together with a Java2-compliant virtual
machine." See also: (1) "NewsML
and IPTC2000" and (2) the announcement from Reuters, "Reuters
and WAVO Team Up to Launch Industry Tool for NewsML."
[December 04, 2000]
The Apache Batik SVG Toolkit.
Company announcements have been released by Sun
Microsystems and ILOG in
connection with the Apache Batik SVG Toolkit Project. Apache's
Batik, now available for download,
is a "Java based toolkit for applications that want to use
images in the Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) format for various
purposes, such as viewing, generation or manipulation." Batik
contributors and supporters include CSIRO, ILOG, The Koala Team,
Eastman Kodak Company, Sun Microsystems, Inc., and IBM. The
project's ambition is "to give developers a set of core modules
which can be used together or individually to support specific SVG
solutions. Example modules are, SVG parsers, SVG generators and SVG
DOM implementations. Another ambition for the Batik project is to
make it highly extensible; for example, Batik allows the developer
to handle custom SVG tags. Even though the goal of the project is to
provide a set of core modules, one of the deliverables is a full
fledged SVG Viewer implementation which validates the various
modules and their inter-operability. With Batik, you can manipulate
SVG documents anywhere Java is available. You can also use the
various Batik modules to generate, manipulate, transcode and search
SVG images in your applications. Batik makes it easy for Java based
applications to deal with SVG contents. For example, using Batik's
SVG generator, a Java application can very easily export its
graphics in the SVG format. Using Batik's SVG processor and viewer,
an application can very easily integrate SVG viewing capabilities.
Another possibility is to use Batik's modules to convert SVG to
various formats, such as raster images (JPEG or PNG)... Batik
provides building blocks that developers can assemble in various
ways in their Java technology applications to generate, parse, view
or convert SVG contents. For example, Batik contains a Swing
component that can add SVG viewing capability to all Java technology
applications. Batik can also be used to generate SVG on a client or
on a server, and Batik can convert SVG content into other formats
such as JPEG or PNG. Batik's goal is to make it easy for application
developers to handle SVG content for various purposes, client-side
or server-side. Batik contains several modules that can be used
independently such as an SVG parser, a object oriented vector
toolkit (GVT) and a set of extensions to the Java 2D API (such as
sophisticated fill types and filter effects). Batik will likely be
used in Cocoon for server side rasterization of SVG images. In
addition, the Batik and the FOP teams have started to work together
to define how the projects can leverage each other's work for SVG to
PDF conversion." The online FAQ
document provides additional detail for developers. See the
announcements from SUN and ILOG for implementation news: (1) "Sun
Microsystems Continues Strong Relationship With the Apache Software
Foundation on Technology Development and Distribution. Batik
Project, a New XML-based Graphical Toolkit, Is Newest Addition to
Joint Technology Initiatives", and (2) "New
ILOG JViews One Of First Products To Support SVG, Emerging XML
Graphics Standard. JViews Developers Playing Role in Creation of New
Open-Source Batik 1.0 Toolkit." See also "W3C
Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG)."
[December 04, 2000]
Character Mapping Markup Language Published as Unicode Technical
Report.
Mark Davis posted an
announcement for the publication of the Unicode Character
Mapping Markup Language (CharMapML) as a full Technical
Report. Reference: Unicode Technical Report #22, by Mark Davis (with
contributions from Kent Karlsson, Ken Borgendale, Bertrand Damiba,
Mark Leisher, Tony Graham, Markus Scherer, Peter Constable, Martin
Duerst, Martin Hoskin, and Ken Whistler). This Unicode technical
report "specifies an XML format for the interchange of mapping
data for character encodings. It provides a complete description for
such mappings in terms of a defined mapping to and from Unicode, and
a description of alias tables for the interchange of mapping table
names." The Unicode Technical Committee "intends to
continue development of this TR to also encompass complex mappings
such as 2022 and glyph-based mappings." Background: "The
ability to seamlessly handle multiple character encodings is crucial
in today's world, where a server may need to handle many different
client character encodings covering many different markets. No
matter how characters are represented, servers need to be able to
process them appropriately. Unicode provides a common model and
representation of characters for all the languages of the world.
Because of this, Unicode is being adopted by more and more systems
as the internal storage processing code. Rather than trying to
maintain data in literally hundreds of different encodings, a
program can translate the source data into Unicode on entry, process
it as required, and translate it into a target character set on
request. Even where Unicode is not used as a process code, it is
often used as a pivot encoding. Data can be converted first
to Unicode and then into the eventual target encoding. This requires
only a hundred tables, rather than ten thousand. Whether or not
Unicode is used, it is ever more vital to maintain the consistency
of data across conversions between different character encodings.
Because of the fluidity of data in a networked world, it is easy for
it to be converted from, say, CP930 on a Windows platform, sent to a
UNIX server as UTF-8, processed, and converted back to CP930 for
representation on another client machine. This requires
implementations to have identical mappings for a character encoding,
no matter what platform they are working on. It also requires them
to use the same name for the same encoding, and different
names for different encodings. This is difficult to do unless there
is a standard specification for the mappings so that it can be
precisely determined what the encoding actually maps to. This
technical report provides such a standard specification for the
interchange of mapping data for character encodings. By using this
specification, implementations can be assured of providing precisely
the same mappings as other implementations on different platforms
The report references several related data files, including (1) DTD
file for the Character Mapping Data format
[CharacterMapping.dtd]; (2) DTD
file for the Character Mapping Alias format
[CharacterMappingAliases.dtd]; (3) Sample
mapping file [SampleMappings.xml]; (4) Sample
alias file [SampleAliases.xml]; (5) Sample
alias file #2 [SampleAliases2.xml]. See "XML
and Unicode."
[December 04, 2000]
Universal Learning Format (ULF) for eLearning Data Interchange.
A communiqué from Daniel
Lipkin (Chief Architect, Saba Software) reports on the
development of the Universal Learning Format (ULF) and its RDF
mapping to the IEEE Learning Objects Metadata (LOM) format.
"Universal Learning Format (ULF) is a complete suite of XML and
RDF-based data formats for describing and exchanging eLearning data.
The standards. The formats build on and are compatible with a wide
variety of industry standards for exchanging learning data,
including ADL, IEEE, IMS,
Dublin Core, and vCard. ULF's compatibility with other standards
ensures that data described in ULF is universally portable across
all systems and taxonomies that are designed to support virtually
any recognized industry standard. It also means that the ULF will
shadow new developments in its constituent standards, thus providing
a direct path for future extensibility. Universal Learning Format
comprises Learning Catalogs and Metadata, Online Classes and
Assessments, Learner Profiles, Competency Libraries and
Certification Libraries. ULF includes a Catalog
Format, which is an RDF mapping of IEEE LOM, augmented with
additional catalog and eCommerce information. For more information,
including examples and a tutorial, please refer to the ULF web site
at http://www.saba.com/standards/ulf."
Details are provided in the principal specification document: "A
Comprehensive Architecture for Learning. Universal Learning Format,
Version 1.0." Note than the IEEE
Learning Object Metadata Working Group [IEEE P1484.12],
operating under the IEEE Learning Technology Standards Committee
(LTSC), is developing a standard to "specify the syntax and
semantics of Learning Object Metadata, defined as the attributes
required to fully/adequately describe a Learning Object. Learning
Objects are defined here as any entity, digital or non-digital,
which can be used, re-used or referenced during technology supported
learning. Examples of technology supported learning include
computer-based training systems, interactive learning environments,
intelligent computer-aided instruction systems, distance learning
systems, and collaborative learning environments. Examples of
Learning Objects include multimedia content, instructional content,
learning objectives, instructional software and software tools, and
persons, organizations, or events ref
