> What do you mean by: "or sending XML data without a framework to
> > constrain it." ? Are you talking about having a pre-defined
> understanding
> between trading partners as to what each XML tag means?
>
Yes.
No. We are talking about having standardized templates on which to build
understandings between trading partners. This is the current big difference
between XML (general XML not XYZ's implementation of it) and the traditional
eCommerce formats (X12/EDIFACT). Moves are afoot to correct this but until a
standards body (ISO, ANSI, whatever) defines it and everyone agrees to use
it, we will still have the problem and XML will not blossom into its full
potential.
On the communications front, hurrah for anything that shoots Async and
Bisync (2780/3780). Lots of VANs now allow you to use IP connectivity for
FTP and/or SMTP to send to and receive from your mailbox, some over the
internet others over leased lines using frame relay. What has been slow in
appearing is individual organizations allowing you to exchange EDI via SMTP
or FTP although I believe some large hardware retail companies are
experimenting with SMTP, God bless 'em.
Andy
-----Original Message-----
From: Hurd, Richard A (Rich) [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Tuesday, April 18, 2000 11:47
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Once Again, To XML Or Not To XML (Was: Retrieve files from
websit e unattended (Also Dismay))
> What do you mean by: "or sending XML data without a framework to
> > constrain it." ? Are you talking about having a pre-defined
> understanding
> between trading partners as to what each XML tag means?
>
Yes.
> I see this as a basic requirement of ANY computer-computer interaction
> that
> involves automated intelligent processing. This is just the same as the
> X12/EDIFACT/etc transaction formatting standards, right?
>
My point exactly! Why are we touting XML as the next best thing to canned
bread when we already HAVE frameworks? We don't need no steenking
frameworks!
> If I wasn't given
> (or had access to in another way) the definitions by my trading partners
> of
> what all those transactions/segments meant then I wouldn't be able to know
> where it fit into my databases.... XML or X12 or EDIFACT or any other
> formatting standard. So, whether it is XML or X12 doesn't make the fact
> that you need to know what it all MEANS any different. I have no
> extraordinary love of XML as a formatting standard but, then again,
> neither
> do I have any more love for X12/EDIFACT/etc.
>
Ditto here. I believe, however, that there are too many who are seeing XML
as that silver bullet that I spoke about, and forgetting the fact that it
isn't going to work by itself. It will require a major sea-change in the
way we do business, especially for those trading partners who are in a
marriage with X12/EDIFACT (whether love is involved or not is of no moment.)
> I *would* like to see my major trading partners move to an internet-based
> transport mechanism and get rid of this Bisync 3780 junk they have now.
> My
> support costs for that one piece of hardware/software outweighs all the
> internet connection hardware/software costs by a factor of 4! I'd be
> happy
> with just the plain old X12 formatting but if they'd go with XML then it
> would take two translating steps out of my loop for all of my various
> clients.
>
Flexibility is the key. XML may be the next great technology leap, or it
may enable the next great technology leap, or it may be the next Betamax.
Whatever its legacy, let us not forget that there is a huge base of
installed EDI that's been working fine for years. We don't want to become
dinosaurs, but neither do we want to get smacked by the comet as it lands in
the swamp.
How would adoption of XML by your TPs take two translating steps out of your
processing loop?
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