[wsrp-conformance] Conformance guide?

[Rich Thompson <richt2@us.ibm.com>]

As I began trying to reflect the use
profiles into the assertions spreadsheet and also reflected some on Rex's
comments about using the use profiles within the Primer, a couple of things
began to make me think a separate Conformance Guide might be useful. Reasons
include:
1. For those seeking to know what it
means to conform to the "Complex Producer" level without a need
or desire to know details about the protocol (e.g. someone reviewing a
purchase requisition for a particular product), even the Primer will be
too technical.
2. Many (possibly even most) of the
things that distinguish one use profile from another can not be tested
by a conformance suite (e.g. the Complex Producer offers local persistence),
but are readily apparent and/or demonstrable by products.

Whether or not we do a separate guide,
we do need to flesh out the Use Profiles with some examples. Here are some
suggestions:
 Simple Producer:
    - Simple containers (i.e.
limited functionality)
    - Single portlet based
systems/applications

 Complex Producer:
    - Full container based
frameworks such as portals or application servers

Simple Consumer:
    - Web page plug-in?
    - ActiveX control?

 Medium Consumer:
    - Application server?

Complex Consumer:
    - Full aggregating engines
such as portals


Are these roughly what people have been
thinking these levels apply to?

Rich Thompson