RE: What do people really expect from ebXML? - Is CC really a set ofLegos?

["Gregory, Arofan" <arofan.gregory@commerceone.com>]

Folks:

This is an interesting dicsussion of "top-down" versus "bottom-up", and I
think William has a valid point - no amount of "top-down" analysis - short
of modelling each and every back-office system in UML - will give you the
full data set needed to determine the exact details of the payload.

Obviously, we will be modelling processes - and not detailed processing -
according to the BP work, and these with a focus on the exchange between
enterprises.

There is still a need to agree on the basic payload, and I would argue that,
while consistent top-down design is highly desirable, it is not the critical
lack that we have. The problem we have is understanding the requirements for
where CC and BP meet, so that "top-down" design can be intelligently done,
and then work can be carried on within that framework for the bottom up.

I would argue that this is how we fill the bits in the middle that connect
the core components (aka "legos", except that my personal legos can be
turned into programmable robots that treat each other in a predatory
fashion, not what was intended by the use of the name, I don't think...)
with the business process.

I firmly believe that process-building, UML-based interfaces can be made to
produce good documents. What is needed is a clearer definition of where the
UML process modelling stops, and where the "payload" begins. Otherwise, you
end up building your documents in all of their grisly detail as UML models,
which is a nightmare activity that should be experienced before it is
advocated. There are better modelling methodologies for the details of
documents than UML, and have been for a long time. What is wanted is an easy
way for a UML process tool to reference a set of existing components,
indicate how they will need to be modified, and then carry on. We need to
tie together the business process and the document design, not simply
abandon the second for the first.

In all examples of UML-based document generation tools I have seen (not all,
I am sure), the binding between the process model and the document
definition describes lots of good "stuff" about how business data is
modelled in XML. I believe that this "binding" is maybe a critical piece of
the standardization that needs to be done if such systems are to work. This
is, in fact, at the heart of the work being done around "context" in the CC
group!

Cheers,

Arofan Gregory

-----Original Message-----
From: William J. Kammerer [mailto:wkammerer@foresightcorp.com]
Sent: Monday, April 30, 2001 11:43 AM
To: ebXML Core
Subject: RE: What do people really expect from ebXML? - Is CC really a
set of Legos?


Betty Harvey bemoaned the demise of the IETF DTD VCard specification,
since having a standard for personal information would keep you from
having to fill in the same damn information over and over again on web
forms.  Though VCard smacks of B2C, it does have some carryover into
ebXML I suppose, and I just wanted to remind Betty of the W3C's Platform
for Privacy Preferences (P3P), at http://www.w3.org/P3P/, which looks
like a successor to VCard.

I previously brought P3P to our attention last month, at
http://lists.ebxml.org/archives/ebxml-core/200103/msg00099.html, to show
that its Section 5.3.5.1 (Postal) describes a simple structure for
postal mailing addresses - for consideration in modeling ebXML's own
Address core component.  Of course, Mike Conroy also showed other
examples from ERP file layouts giving simple address structures.  I
wanna know what sort of "top-down" analysis starting with the business
model gave us the "postal address.details" aggregate shown in Initial CC
Structure v1-03.xls. Anybody??

William J. Kammerer
FORESIGHT Corp.
4950 Blazer Pkwy.
Dublin, OH USA 43017-3305
+1 614 791-1600

Visit FORESIGHT Corp. at http://www.foresightcorp.com/
"accelerating time-to-trade"



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