XML changing E-commerce 1

[mbdw6708]

Is anyone using XML to integrate their systems?&nbsp;&nbsp;The reading I have done seems to say that XML will be the thing that makes e-commerce even better.&nbsp;&nbsp;Let me know your thoughts.&nbsp;&nbsp;<br>Dave

 

[kfickert]

I have heard that XML is going to be the next big thing for the last couple years, and really I havn't found a great uses for it yet other than some XML parsing in PHP.&nbsp;&nbsp;Even that was in a rare instant.<br>XML is really being pushed by Microsoft, and from what I've read it looks to be vary flexible, but I don't know if it will ever catch on fire before the next great thing comes along.

 

[slok]

XML is going to be an important component when it comes<br>to projects or implementation that involves a wide variety<br>of legacy system. Don't limit yourself into thinking about<br>or revolving around the word

 

[TheGolem]

I'm easing into XML with XHTML, which I've transformed most my pages to, except <br>for the message boards on my server because I'm still having a problem with forms, <br>which are yet not too friendly in transitional XHTML, unless one uses the commercial <br>Misquito product or their templates. I think this is still being worked on but I did run<br>into an interesting problem with CDATA using the & in several cgi links.. Replacing it with &amp; would validate until the next time it parsed and the &amp; will have disappeared, but that problem was resolved by using two ampersands instead of one. After it parses you only see one of them, but it sticks [g].. Anotherwords the & would be replaced with &amp;amp; instead of &amp; and that seems to work. Amaya is kind of neat but haven't installed Tidy yet in my Linux box because it is just as easy to do the markup by hand. I like it. Everything seems to load faster and looks a whole lot better. If anyone wants to take a look (they all validate), start at: <A HREF="

http://pnews.org/"

TARGET="_new">

http://pnews.org/</A><br><br>TheGolem

 

[TheGolem]

Interestingly the same happens here. The extra amp; didn't show up in my post, but there were two of them there. The results are the same. One sticks.<br><br>TheGolem

 

[mbdw6708]

Thanks for the information<br><br>Dave<br><A HREF="

http://www.supplychaintoday.com"

TARGET="_new">

http://www.supplychaintoday.com</A>

 

[venkat47]

xml is certainly to catch up. xml & DHTML are to stay longer in E-commerce. XMl is going to be the future standard as it is going to be part of OBI. It integrates easliy with JAVA, simpler in terms of database objects. However, too many parameters / variables and anything can be used and also it can be customised between 2 businesses and eventually replace EDI. this will happen as XML is reviwed by W3C as std and the recent browsers support XML parsing. we should watch for the trends for the next 3 ro4 months before we can easily conclude [sig][/sig]

 

[mbdw6708]

Definitely some great insight about XML. The more I research XML the more it is coming up in the mainstream. Microsoft, Sun and IBM all have big XML initiatives. I have been studying XML which doesn't seem too difficult but I am having trouble with XSL. Any more thoughts on XSL.
Dave Waters

http://www.supplychaintoday.com

[sig][/sig]

 

[Flower]

Yes, what little reading on XML I have done I would agree it is important to the Net. However, I need to learn more to assess it's value and report on it's importance in supporting eBusiness. Can you recommend any good books?
Thanks
Mary [sig][/sig]

 

[mbdw6708]

Mary,
I have a few books on XML but they are mainly about programming and how to connect systems together. If you really want to know what is going on with XML in the industry right now do searches in the major supply chain sites. You can go here,

http://www.supplychaintoday.com/news xml.htm

and it will give you the 20 latest XML articles from many different sources. What type of value do you need to assess. Do you want to know whether or not your company needs to look into it or do you want to know how XML will be changing e-business. Have a great day.
Regards
Dave Waters

http://www.supplychaintoday.com

[sig][/sig]

 

[Flower]

Thanks Dave,
I need to know how XML will support and hence change e-business. Have a good day also.
Regards
Mary [sig][/sig]

 

[mbdw6708]

Mary,
A better question is how is it not going to change e-business. Actually there is a lot of hype out there right now concerning XML, but if only half of it is true it will be changing e-business. I definitely wouldn't say change everything to XML right away until the major companies begin moving towards XML. The next generation of browsers are all suppose to support XML. If companies like Microsoft and IBM are backing XML you know it is going to be big. Check out XML.com or XML.org. XHTML is the transition language to replace HTML with XML for web development. If you don't want to search for articles go to SupplyChainToday.com and find the articles section. Under technology I have quite a few articles on XML to explain how it will be changing e-business. My e-mail is Davy.Waters@asu.edu if you would like to contact me. My advice is don't believe the hype until you have researched it all yourself.
Regards
Dave Waters

http://www.supplychaintoday.com

[sig][/sig]

 

[wduty]

Developer's two cents.

From the point of view of working with XML lately, I have found that it is in fact useful and can simplify a lot of bottlenecks in the development process. For smaller applications you can replace the need for a database completely. For larger scenarios you can at least improve application maintainability by avoiding the old problem of including HTML in your asp or java code which couples datastore to client more closely and makes for cloudy code. Also it allows for output to different emerging technologies like wireless without requiring application redevelopment.

As far as replacing HTML in people's browsers I think that's a ways off because of the everpresent need for backwards compatibility. Even if every browser released starting today had full XML support, it will be a few years before major sites would rely solely on XML.

This &quot;ideal&quot; scenario would represent something like:

[red][tab][tab][tab]server[tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab]browser
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
(database ->) XML[tab]->[tab]process[tab][tab][tab][tab]->[tab][tab][tab]XML/XSL[/red]

but I think it is currently useful to developers because it represents something like:

[red][tab][tab][tab]server[tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab][tab]browser
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
(database ->)XML->XSL->HTML[tab][tab][tab][tab]->[tab][tab][tab][tab][tab]HTML[/red]

But these are all technical conveniences and as Dave Waters pointed out above, the bigger question is how this is going to change the industry (and therefore make someone lots of money). Funny that there is seemingly more lively discussion here than in the actual XML forum...



[sig]<p>--Will Duty<br><a href=mailto:wduty@radicalfringe.com>wduty@radicalfringe.com</a><br><a href= > </a><br> [/sig]

 

[mbdw6708]

XML really seems to making a huge surge in the b2b market where networking various computers and legacy systems is the main purpose. The best thing about learning XML is there are multiple purposes, one is web design (xhtml right now) and the other is integrating computer systems. If anyone is interested in more discussion on e-business or supply chain management I have just started a Discussion Board on my site. (

http://www.supplychaintoday.com)

Supply Chain Management might be out of the realm of Tek-Tips but I know a lot of people are interested. If anyone from Tek-Tips is reading this please look into adding a Supply Chain forum. [sig][/sig]

 

[mbdw6708]

There has been a real push to XML in the integration software market. webMethods is based on XML along with several other software providers. Any thoughts on this.
DAve

http://www.supplychaintoday.com

 

[Guest_imported]

You may want to check out

http://www.xml.com,

http://www.xml.org

and the news on XML:

http://www.supplychaintoday.com/news xml.htm