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A pragmatic convergence of ebXML & Web services: is this a second chance for the industry? (contrary opinion).

Article Excerpt
The 18-month-old Electronic Business XML project ended officially in Vienna this past May 11, 2001. ebXML was an ambitious and high-profile initiative of two neutral industry groups: OASIS and the United Nations' Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (UN/CEFACT).

What was the mission of ebXML? According to the ebXML Web FAQ: "ebXML is a modular suite of specifications that enables enterprises of any size and in any geographical location to conduct business over the Internet. Using ebXML, companies now have a standard method to exchange business messages, conduct trading relationships, communicate data in common terms, and define and register business processes."

As this is clearly a worthwhile goal, scores of technology vendors participated in the ebXML project in one way or another. ebXML had many parallel working teams (e.g., Requirements, Registry/Repository; Transport/Routing, Security, Business Processes, Proof-of-Concept). Some companies led the effort to write specifications; my own company; Killdara, focused on the live Proof-of-Concept interoperability demos.

I won't pretend to be an expert in any of these areas. However, 20 years of building software products has made me an expert on implementing standards, and I'm afraid that ebXML has not succeeded in defining a standard in all of these areas. A standard is concise, tightly structured, implementable. Conformance to a standard can be tested and certified. Some parts of ebXML (e.g., Transport/Routing) approach this, but other parts don't.

The publication of a simple, concrete set of XML-based business messaging standards would have helped the industry immeasurably. Until this standard emerges, we won't see the wildfire build-out of commercial XML networks that...

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