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XML and Web Services In The News - 18 May 2006
Provided by OASIS |
Edited by Robin Cover
This issue of XML.org Daily Newslink is sponsored by Innodata Isogen
HEADLINES:
Integration of Services - Integration of Standards
Theo van Veen and Ray Denenberg, D-Lib Magazine Workshop Report
On March 3, 2006, the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (KB) and the SRU
Implementers Group held a workshop in The Hague with the theme
"Integration of Services; Integration of Standards", following a
two-day SRU (Search and Retrieval via URL) Implementers Group meeting.
The purpose of the workshop was to hear about and discuss what should
be the next steps to improve integration of services and applications,
with the main focus on integration with or via SRU. Two mechanisms
were discussed: (1) protocols that have been standardised or
formalised to some degree (for example, SRU, OpenURL and OAI) and
(2) other services that might benefit from the standards or could be
used in conjunction with the standards. The SRU Implementer Group
meeting preceding the Integration of Services; Integration of Standards
workshop was very fruitful. There will be a much-needed bibliographic
index set developed, based on MODS semantics. There will be an OpenURL
profile, which will prescribe a mapping from these bibliographic
indexes to OpenURL keys. The basic standardization plan presented
was approved in principal, to take SRU to OASIS. Included for
standardization along with SRU would be CQL, Scan, the Explain
Operation (but not the Explain specification itself), and mappings:
SRU over SOAP (i.e., SRW), and SRU Post.
See also: on OpenURL
W3C Launches WebCGM Working Group
Staff, W3C Announcement
W3C has announced the launch of a Web CGM Working Group with Lofton
Henderson as the Working Group Chair. Computer Graphics Metafile, or
CGM, is an ISO standard for tree-structured, binary graphics format
that has been adopted especially by the technical industries
(defense, aviation, transportation, etc) for technical illustration
in electronic documents. The new Working group is chartered to
develop a W3C Recommendation for WebCGM 2.0, starting with the
WebCGM 2.0 Submission from OASIS. "WebCGM finds significant application
especially in technical illustration, electronic documentation, and
geophysical data visualization, amongst other application areas.
WebCGM 2.0 adds a DOM (API) specification for programmatic access to
WebCGM objects, and a specification of an XML Companion File (XCF)
architecture, for externalization of non-graphical metadata. WebCGM
2.0, in addition, builds upon and extends the graphical and intelligent
content of WebCGM 1.0, delivering functionality that was forecast for
WebCGM 1.0, but was postponed in order to get the standard and its
implementations to users expeditiously. The design criteria for
WebCGM aim at a balance between graphical expressive power on the
one hand, and simplicity and implementability on the other. A small
but powerful set of standardized metadata elements supports the
functionalities of hyperlinking and document navigation, picture
structuring and layering, and enabling search and query of WebCGM
picture content.
See also: the WebCGM 2.0 submission request
OpenAjax Alliance Formally Opens for Business
Tony Baer, Computer Busines Review Online
OpenAjax has renamed itself the OpenAjax Alliance and has finalized
its first roadmap, according to members of the group at the JavaOne
developers' conference in San Francisco. The group has decided that
it will not be a standards body, but will instead operate in a manner
similar to WS-I, the Web Services Interoperability Organization. Its
goals are to identify and consolidate best practices, then define
consensus programming models around a reference Ajax implementation,
so Ajax tools can interoperate. The first two initiatives are to
fashion a declarative XML language that would serve as an intermediary
for tools to write to, in order to generate the JavaScript runtime.
In so doing, it would define APIs for widgets, event handlers, and
other features of Ajax tools to map. The hope is that a common syntax
for specifying Ajax features and behaviors could emerge so tooling
and runtimes could become interoperable. The group itself has been
somewhat of a moving target, with membership growing rapidly. On
May 9, the organization announced nine new members, including Adobe,
SAP, Software AG, and Tibco. Since the JavaOne meeting, three more
companies have announced their intentions to join. At this point,
the most prominent remaining holdout is Microsoft Corp, which
ironically invented the DHTML component of Ajax technology and
promotes its own Ajax flavor, called Project Atlas.
W3C Turns Up 'Dial' for Mobile Content
Clint Boulton, InternetNews.com
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has published Device Independence
Authoring Language (DIAL), a markup script for how authors can write
mobile content software that will work on different handheld devices.
Mobile content is a multi-million-dollar opportunity for content
creators and wireless operators. Millions of consumers want to play
games, or download e-mail, video and audio clips from handheld gadgets.
In short, content consumers want to be able to do everything on a Palm
Treo smartphone or handheld computer that they can do on a home PC.
The problem is that more than 2,500 devices litter the market, making
it difficult to write applications that will work on all machines. As
it does for so many sectors in high-tech, interoperability remains a
stumbling block in mobile technologies. DIAL, created by companies such
as IBM, Nokia and Vodaphone, is the W3C's solution to the problem. The
W3C said the framework offers a way for authors to write content that
is more adaptable to disparate devices by describing data, styling,
layout and interaction independently.
See also: the DIAL Working Draft
Rival Teams Sun, Microsoft Form Alliance for Java And .Net
Charles Babcock, InformationWeek
Microsoft and Sun say they'll cooperate in offering security,
messaging, and quality of service in building enterprise services.
According to the announcement, "Sun and Microsoft engineers are
closely collaborating to help ensure that implementations of WCF-
based services and Java Platform Enterprise Edition 5 (Java EE 5)
based services will be interoperable, allowing a single business
process design to run seamlessly across the Java platform and the
.NET framework. In addition, integration with the Sun Business
Process Execution Language (BPEL) Engine enables developers to
apply business logic and orchestrate complex business processes
and workflows. The specific interoperable WSIT technologies that
will be delivered within the scope of this open source effort are:
(1) Quality of Service -- WS-Reliable Messaging, WS-Coordination,
WS-Transactions; (2) Security -- WS-Security, WS-Trust, WS-Secure
Conversation, WS-Security Policy; (3) Metadata -- WSDL, XML Schema,
WS-Policy, WS-Metadata Exchange; (4) Messaging -- SOAP,
WS-Addressing, Message Transmission Optimization Mechanism (MTOM).
See also: the announcement
Ecma Office Open XML File Formats Standard - Intermediate Draft 1.3
Staff, Ecma International
Ecma has posted an announcement for the release of Ecma/TC45/2006/139
as a Public Distribution for "Office Open XML Document Interchange
Specification" being produced within the Ecma International Technical
Committee (TC45). The committee "is working to establish a standard
for Office Open XML File Formats as described in the TC45 program of
work. The goals are to: (1) produce a standard which is fully compatible
with the Office Open XML Formats, including full and comprehensive
documentation of those formats in the style of an international
standard, with particular attention given to enabling the
implementation of the Office Open XML Formats by a wide set of tools
and platforms in order to foster interoperability across office
productivity applications and with line-of-business systems.
(2) Produce a comprehensive set of W3C XML Schemas for the Office Open
XML Formats, with particular attention given to self documentation of
the schemas and testing of the XSDs for validation using a wide
variety of XSD tools of the market and cross platform." The Draft 1.3
work in progress weighs in at 4081 pages and 24 MB (PDF). The plan
is contribute the Ecma Office Open XML Formats standards to ISO/IEC
JTC 1 for approval and adoption by ISO and IEC.
See also: TC45 Office Open XML Formats
ISO Approval of OASIS OpenDocument Is a Blow to Microsoft
Rita E. Knox and Michael A. Silver, Gartner Research Report
"On 8 May 2006, the International Organization for Standardization
(ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) approved
the OpenDocument Format (ODF) for release as ISO/IEC 26300. ODF, an
XML-defined specification created by OpenOffice.org and developed by
the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards
(OASIS), aims to enable different applications to exchange documents."
According to Gartner analysis (based upon various assigned
probabilities): "ODF opens up opportunities for new products -- for
example, users could create integrated "composite" documents using
text, graphics or spreadsheet elements, without shifting between
applications. Applications and suites that support ODF include
Google's Writely, IBM Workplace and Sun's StarOffice. By 2010, ODF
document exchange will be required by 50 percent of government and
20 percent of commercial organizations... The future of Microsoft's
proposed Open XML format is unclear. Microsoft only submitted this
format for the European Computer Manufacturers Association's (Ecma's)
approval in late 2005, after Massachusetts mandated that agencies
use ODF for office productivity documents. Until Massachusetts'
decision, Microsoft seemed to ignore growing support for ODF.
Microsoft plans to submit its XML format to ISO after Ecma approval.
But ISO will not approve multiple XML document formats..."
See also: PDF
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