Re: [ubl-dev] Getting started with UBL-2.0

[jon.bosak@sun.com]

Just touching base for a second to respond to a couple of
points....

[fairwinds@eastlink.ca:]

| In terms of representing my own items as a schema, I guess it
| should be a combination of BIE plus my own customizaion - but when
| it comes to the production of standard documents, they must
| validate and conform to UBL-2.0.

If you're talking about extending any of the 31 document types
provided by UBL 2.0 with extra information items, see Section
B.3.3 of the UBL 2.0 Standard:

   http://docs.oasis-open.org/ubl/os-UBL-2.0/UBL-2.0.html#d0e3968

> Do you see any big changes to these entities in future?

No major updates to UBL will be made for at least the next two
years.  There will be minor version releases during that time (the
next would be UBL 2.1), but these by definition can only add new
optional elements -- they can't remove any of the existing ones or
change their meaning.  If the information elements you need really
aren't accommodated by existing UBL constructs, and if they are
useful outside of your particular application, we'd be interested
to hear about them so that they can be considered for addition in
2.1.

| BTW, Has anyone been working on xsl for styling the standard
| documents?

This falls within the scope of the UBL Human Interface
Subcommittee:

   http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=ubl-hisc

The big question here is which printed document formats to map to.
In UBL 1.0, we created specific mappings between the eight UBL 1.0
documents and the UN Layout Key, which for over thirty years has
specified standard printed representations for basic trade
documents.  Then HISC chair G. Ken Holman created XSLT stylesheets
that will transform any conformant UBL 1.0 instance into either an
HTML UNLK representation or (given appropriate XSL-FO formatting
software) a PDF file.  Based on those stylesheets, Jacek Ambroziak
contributed a Java application that will do the HTML conversion
for free, and Visual Programming contributed a run-time version of
their XSL-FO engine that will do the PDF conversion for free.  All
this great stuff is linked to from the UBL 1.0 Legacy Page:

   http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/22571/legacy.htm

UBL 2.0, on the other hand, contains a number of document types
that simply have no internationally standardized printed
representation.  We're hoping for the contribution of
quasi-standard versions of these documents (printed forms used
within a particular industry or a particular region, for example)
that could serve as targets.  People interested in helping out
with this should contact the HISC chair
(gkholman@CraneSoftwrights.com) in a week or two when he gets back
from vacation.

Jon