[ebxml-dev] Not at all tangential ... interop & ebXML implementationslists

[James Bryce Clark <jamie.clark@mmiec.com>]

At 09:11 AM 6/13/02, Michael C. Rawlins 
wrote:
> A couple of (perverse?) tangential
> observations for your consideration.  These have to do with ebXML
> itself and not particularly with this thread:
> 1)  One of the primary goals of ebXML was to enable
> interoperability.   

    It is a challenge to interoperability when some
participants apparently are under orders to go off and start a new
splinter group, every time they can't (1) run it, or (2) exclusively own
the IP.  Almost everyone who didn't stay with ebXML seems to be
shipping a Better-than-ebXML these days.  :)  Must be a lot of
money to be made out there in Proprietary Land.
     But interop does not depend on
vendors.  The users -- the customers! -- are tiring of multiplicity,
and showing an increasingly smart preference for stricter IP hygiene and
stricter levels of fairness, openness and vendor neutrality.  
    Thank heaven.

> Two years
> after its inception interoperability is still a problem and UN/CEFACT and
> OASIS are sponsoring interoperability seminars.  Clearly the work is
> not yet finished.

    Just to be clear about the "Interop"
conferences.   So far as I can tell, OMG, OASIS and others have
co-led these seminars, set the agenda and orchestrated things. 
ebXML as a project, and the CEFACT agencies who run some of it, were not
brought in as a partner or co-lead anywhere, although a few of us did
attend, and I think we were asked to be a nominal cosponsor at the last
minute last time.  
     So:  interop = good, "Interop
Summit" = somebody else's production.  We wish it well, and I
think some of the ebXML leads will be there again this year as
attendees.

> 2)  
> It seems to me that the majority of discussion on this listserv has been
> about general discussion topics (of which this thread is an example)
> rather than substantive technical questions related to ebXML development
> and implementation.  Lots of lists have fairly low signal to noise
> ratios, but the relatively low signal on this one makes me wonder about
> implementations.
> Cheers,
> Mike

Ebxml-dev has a lot of product and standards content because it is
one of our few project-wide lists.  Most of the other ebxml lists
are allocated to specific, narrow work products from a discrete OASIS or
CEFACT working group.   

So far, implementation announcements are mostly being noted on the
ebxml.org web site, not here.   As a public nonprofit effort we are
less oriented towards press releases and vaporware.  So perhaps we
do not brag enough.  

Gee, Mike, are Covisint, STAR, RosettaNet, SWIFT, OAG, ebXMLSoft,
OpenebXML, Sybase, Oracle, Pan Asian Alliance, Electronic Commerce
Promotion Council of Japan, Boeing, the XML Global toolset, ZenAptix's
Xeco, Component-X, BindStudio, Open Interchange Consortium, Briyante,
EAN-UCC, Open Travel Alliance, BitDaemons Ltd.'s Octimal, Korea Trade
Network, Sun, Sterling Commerce, Hong Kong University, Victoria (AU) Gas
Market, Global TradeDesk, ERCOT (State of Texas), US NIST, Korea
Institute for Electronic Commerce, Cyclone Commerce, Drummond Group, and
Kasumi Co. Ltd. insufficient?  Mind you, these are not committee
members or logo sponsors, these are people building and testing software
and data structures.  Now.  To our standards. 
Voluntarily.     

I apologize to those not listed, or misspelled, but only had a few
minutes to pull this together ... by scanning the last few pages of
traffic on ebxml-dev.  There are many other equally worthy projects
and listings on our open mail-list archives, and on the ebxml.org
"implementations" page.  I know of others as well that
have not announced;  the foregoing sources only reflect announced
efforts.

Maybe in my next life I will be a PR flak instead of a lawyer.

Best regards  Jamie

~ James Bryce Clark 
~ VP and General Counsel, McLure-Moynihan Inc.  
www.mmiec.com 
~ Chair, US ABA Business Law Subcommittee on Electronic Commerce 
~
www.abanet.org/buslaw/cyber/ecommerce/ecommerce.html
~ 1 818 597 9475   jamie.clark@mmiec.com   jbc@lawyer.com 
~ This message is neither legal advice nor a binding signature.  Ask me why.