[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]
Subject: RE: [ubl-dev] an iPod of ebXML
Roger, Great to hear from you again and to know that you are continuing to fight the fight and succeeding. I believe the old adage applies here - "if it was simple, it would have been done already!" As you note - new tools do make an impact - but it is not as simple as plugging into the electrical grid. Each hill, each bunker, each trench has to be crossed - because the legacy component has to be re-tooled or replaced and the intelligence it contains inherited. So the power of many hands - creating the infrastructure so that many can make a lighter load and also share and re-use once a particular interface has been built. We are definately succeeding there thru open source solutions and components. This stuff is getting spontaneously easier and better - and the market is listening and making changes in what it acquires too - not continuing to go down the old paths. I'd offer my recent present on XML scripting as yet more examples of this osmosis in progress: http://www.pesc.org/events/techstandards/third/presentations/Using%20XML%20Scripting%20for%20Business%20and%20Life.ppt People are using XML in many areas from Flash to Blogs to Photo sites to maps and automated voice systems to OASIS CAM! The true measure here is definately when people are using solutions completely unaware of the fact that the core technology inside is actually based on ebXML components. Perhaps we're more closer to those building the memory chips and audio rendering firmware that go into the iPods... ; -) DW -------- Original Message -------- Subject: RE: [ubl-dev] an iPod of ebXML From: "Roger Bass" <roger@traxian.com> Date: Fri, May 12, 2006 3:13 pm To: "Governor James" <jgovernor@redmonk.com>, "David RR Webber (XML)" <david@drrw.info>, "Bill Chessman" <bill.chessman@inovis.com> Cc: <ubl-dev@lists.oasis-open.org>, <EDI-L@yahoogroups.com>, "Klaus-Dieter Naujok" <klaus@naujok.us> James et al, You're right. I got interested in this 10 years or so back when still at Intuit, not least working on online banking, which has some parallels to this space. Since then, I've spoken to David, Jon Bosak and a number of others from this list. I mostly scan/lurk here, but wanted to respond on this. I do think there's some confusion about what that "iPod" is. Whether or not ebXML, UBL etc are used, they are *NOT* user requirements, nor have they any role in defining an end-user product. Users shouldn't even see those words. Easy, seamless, interoperability between trading partners' applications is the user requirement. In a sense, I think a "Cisco" is the better analogy - a platform to enable standards-based networking to be connected with the messy legacy stuff at the network edge. I see most of the stuff discussed here as finding its application, eventually, at the "network center" not the "network edge". Islands of B2B connectivity will need to interconnect, and mass market B2B network platform leaders, as they emerge, will want the scalability that comes from internally having one standard way of doing things (and externally, one or as few as possible). Unlike the web, however, this is not a problem where a standard can sweep all before it as a mass adoption enabler. That's because the legacy apps, with all their quirky data structures, interfaces and processes, aren't going away. The real business momentum towards solving this is happening within industries. Often, an industry standard is part of that, but customer demand driving cooperation from key suppliers and legacy app vendors is the bigger issue. And data standards can't really be completed until a fair amount of real-world deployment has worked out the bugs. Apps here are typically small vertical apps, not Oracle, SAP... or even QuickBooks, though those apps do feature as well. Traxian, the company I started after leaving Intuit, is wading through this mud to build these communities of connected apps, to enable this seamless, easy, low-cost interoperability. Specifically, we're focused on a couple of industries (eg high-tech, wholesale distribution, retail) that have pain around the problem, and in particular, a need to drive B2B connectivity to smaller trading partners. We've been working with some of the big names in those industries (Intel, Cisco, Coca-Cola, Anheuser-Busch). SMBs are key though, because existing technologies are too expensive for them - others will stick with the legacy stuff. But still, building interoperable connections in these communities starts out by connecting with those who have something - via email, FTP.. sometimes EDI VANS (yes!) and with the bigger guys, mostly AS2. At the data level, it's mostly proprietary application formats. Where standards play, it's industry-specific XML efforts and EDI. The size and sparseness of generalized standards makes mapping harder... Also, target systems (i.e. data consumers) can tell you how they need their data in EDI, or their native format. Until and unless such a data consumer leaps to making a new standard *their* standard for implementations (very rare!), or until scalability requires it, it's make-work to introduce some new intermediate standard. So why I am here, and bothering to post this? Well, Traxian aspires to be such a platform. We're building it the only way I think you can, paying our dues by building user communities, one customer and one application at a time. But eventually, as we scale, and solve these problems for bigger communities, and interconnect with others, I expect horizontal standards will become a part of what we do. If a big "hub" or community wants to get more of their SMB partners (and their applications) connected, then Traxian can help (whether or not they have made ebXML/UBL their standard). I'd be happy to discuss any such situations further. Re the standards - Traxian may be a 'customer' eventually, and deploy at mass scale, but not today. Regards, Roger Bass Founder, Traxian. -----Original Message----- From: Governor James [mailto:jgovernor@redmonk.com] Sent: Friday, May 12, 2006 2:24 AM To: David RR Webber (XML); Bill Chessman Cc: ubl-dev@lists.oasis-open.org; EDI-L@yahoogroups.com; Klaus-Dieter Naujok Subject: [ubl-dev] an iPod of ebXML So what with the Apple Mac/Microsoft meme, remixed with a "stalled" ebXML I guess the obvious question is... Who could build the iPod of ebXML? Dean? Farrukh? -----Original Message----- From: David RR Webber (XML) [mailto:david@drrw.info] Sent: 11 May 2006 22:32 To: Bill Chessman Cc: ubl-dev@lists.oasis-open.org; EDI-L@yahoogroups.com; Klaus-Dieter Naujok Subject: RE: [ubl-dev] ebXML approval retrospective Bill, I've just taken a few moments here to read Klaus's piece. Wow - even by Klaus's standards this is a dismal and self-deprecating attack. I'm here to tell everyone that the world of ebXML is nowhere near as forgotten and doomed as Klaus would have you think - and that Klaus really is down on himself when he should be reading more of the items on http://ebxmlforum.net/5-years/ and taking some credit for positive outcomes! Afterall noone ever said this was going to be easy!! I'd take issue with many of Klaus's assertions and his outlook. 1) Turns out the big players DO have current ebXML support in their products, Oracle, IBM ,Sun, BEA, SAP, Fujitsu, Sysbase, etc will all sell you their solutions with ebXML support in them. And Oracles' is brand new - their iHub support for ebXML was released at end of 2005 (and its very good BTW as I've seen it close up). 2) He forgets that ebXML B2B remains the ONLY certified XML interoperable solution out there - with more than a dozen vendors completing the interoperability suite. 3) There are industries that have standardized on ebXML - PIDX (agro-chemical), HL7 healthcare, electrical power - and we see the auto-industry also garnering the benefits of using ebMS too and growing its use. 4) There are large scale deployments - the whole of Norway is using ebXML for healthcare insurance, and the NHS in UK is using it for supplychain support. So OK - in Klaus's self-deprecating stance - these are just tiny little countries on the fringe of Europe that noone pays much mind to. 5) Governments really do appreciate the value of open public standards and open public implementations. While ebXML may not have gone in the direction Klaus wanted for it - nevertheless it is healthy and primed to be an important part of where the internet and eBusiness is going - driven by the open source and open services revolution. 6) ebXML registry for secure document storage (aka IHE/XDS) is about to be THE solution - and ditto for ebXML Regsitry and semantic content retrieval. There is some serious momentum and sophisticated community building behind this - and yes - this is exactly the sort of thing we wanted registry to drive. 7) The new OASIS BPSS work is ground breaking - and OASIS just approved the BCM work - that is founded from the original ebXML / CEFACT UMM concepts. The ebXML solution stack is changing the way people approach engineering their solutions - and yes - this does take time to seep into the IT conciousness. Klaus - come on man - GIVE ME A BREAK! Just because noone is having a huge party and lotsa Hollywood style bruhah does not mean you can sit at your computer terminal and wail into your weak thin American beer, or cheap Californian wine and depress us all! Just because ebXML did not do everything you thought it should you cannot ignore what your child has achieved! I feel like the prodigal son here - and Dad just does not want to entertain anything good could have come of his offspring once he left home and went off on his own. This is the new wave internet community world and we know better. Grass roots is more important than Redmondian brash PR. Get on board the new ebXML and enjoy! We have an awful lot to be proud of and much to thank you for - so quick raining on your own parade - I'm not going to join you in wanting to suck on lemons when I can eat cake and pizza and drink great English beer!! The best of ebXML is yet to come and we can be very proud of what we have already accomplished and the foundations we have created... Remember when everyone trashed Apple as a crippled and broken spear and Klaus was the only guy we knew who had an Apple Mac?!? Cheers, DW -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [ubl-dev] ebXML approval retrospective From: "Bill Chessman" <bill.chessman@inovis.com> Date: Thu, May 11, 2006 1:01 pm To: <ubl-dev@lists.oasis-open.org>, <EDI-L@yahoogroups.com> All, Anybody else notice that today, May 11, 2006, is the 5th anniversary of the approval of the original ebXML project? I see that the chairman of the original project (Klaus-Dieter Naujok) has put up some retrospective commentaries on his blog page at http://www.klauskorner.com/MyBlog/MyBlog.html. For those nostalgic folks that participated, there's even a video from that closing approval meeting. Still wondering where the story goes from here... Best regards, Bill Chessman Inovis(tm) --------------------------------------------------------------------- This publicly archived list supports open discussion on implementing the UBL OASIS Standard. To minimize spam in the archives, you must subscribe before posting. [Un]Subscribe/change address: http://www.oasis-open.org/mlmanage/ Alternately, using email: list-[un]subscribe@lists.oasis-open.org List archives: http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/ubl-dev/ Committee homepage: http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ubl/ List Guidelines: http://www.oasis-open.org/maillists/guidelines.php Join OASIS: http://www.oasis-open.org/join/ --------------------------------------------------------------------- This publicly archived list supports open discussion on implementing the UBL OASIS Standard. To minimize spam in the archives, you must subscribe before posting. [Un]Subscribe/change address: http://www.oasis-open.org/mlmanage/ Alternately, using email: list-[un]subscribe@lists.oasis-open.org List archives: http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/ubl-dev/ Committee homepage: http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ubl/ List Guidelines: http://www.oasis-open.org/maillists/guidelines.php Join OASIS: http://www.oasis-open.org/join/ --------------------------------------------------------------------- This publicly archived list supports open discussion on implementing the UBL OASIS Standard. To minimize spam in the archives, you must subscribe before posting. [Un]Subscribe/change address: http://www.oasis-open.org/mlmanage/ Alternately, using email: list-[un]subscribe@lists.oasis-open.org List archives: http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/ubl-dev/ Committee homepage: http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ubl/ List Guidelines: http://www.oasis-open.org/maillists/guidelines.php Join OASIS: http://www.oasis-open.org/join/
[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]