I am afraid I haven't contributed to this discussion thus far.
On Wed, 6 Mar 2002 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > In Peter's defense I would say he does not seem to be confused, just > expressing normal skepticism. > His statements made in the course of the discussion I can summarize as > following: > 1. There is no need for intermediate XML transformation. This is an untrue statement. A truer statement would be: "There is not need for intermediate XML transformation in some applications". Notice I said 'some' and not 'most'. When you are trading information with multiple organizations, transformation and/or reorganization is almost always the case. A good example of where intermediate transformation is useful is in the airplane manufacturing industry. An airplane manufacturer must supply their information to both commercial and military organizations. Each of these organizations have their own specification for information. In the case of the military, each government have their own requirements. It is unmanageable for the manufacture to maintain their parts, technical documents, ordering requirements, etc. in all the various flavors for each one of their customers. The smart approach is to develop their own XML standard to accommodate their business rules and in some cases to harmonize the requirements of their customers. The result is they have many delivery options from a single data source. They get a new customer with a new requirement it is just another transformation. > 2. OK, I agree that intermediate XML transformation is useful, but tools > other than XSLT can do it as well. Omnimark is probably the program that is most used (besides XSLT). Omnimark works well because you can add complexity to the outgoing XML that is difficult or impossible to do with XSLT. Omnimark also works very well with a two-way transformation, i.e., EDI to XML (XSLT can't do that kind of transformation). Traditional programming languages can also be used but they weren't designed to be used with structured data. However, they work a lot better now that you can use the DOM (or SAX). > 3. OK, I agree XSLT brings some benefits compare to other tools, but I > don't believe it until I see it in action. XSLT has a lot of benefit but it is just a piece of the puzzle. I really think a lot of the confusion of XML is that we have been given a jigsaw puzzle in a plastic bag. There isn't a box with a clear picture on the front. Developers have to visualize the picture looking at the unorganized pieces. Betty /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/ Betty Harvey, XML Consultant, | Phone: 410-787-9200 FAX: 9830 Electronic Commerce Connection, Inc. | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Washington,DC SGML/XML Users Grp URL: http://www.eccnet.com | http://www.eccnet.com/xmlug/ /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\\/\/ ------ XML/edi Group Discussion List ------ Homepage = http://www.XMLedi-Group.org Unsubscribe = send email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Leave the subject and body of the message blank Questions/requests: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To receive only one message per day (digest format) send the following message to [EMAIL PROTECTED], (leave the subject line blank) digest xmledi-group your-email-address To join the XML/edi Group complete the form located at: http://www.xmledi-group.org/xmledigroup/mail1.htm
