Saturday, January 13, 2001
XML: The Dash for Dot.com Interoperability
When the history of Web-based ecommerce is written, XML
may be regarded as a more important development than
HTML in accelerating business on the Web. The reason
is that XML promises to do for Web application interaction
what HTML did for the human reading of Web-based documents.
XML will be able to bridge the islands of information
locked away in incompatible computing systems to provide
a freer interchange of data between these formerly isolated
systems. Through the efforts of many industry consortia,
XML has found a place in industries as diverse as medicine,
insurance, electronic component trading hubs, petrochemicals,
forestry and finance, to name a few. The promise of XML
is multifaceted and huge, but has it achieved serious
acceptance in the corporate world?
To answer this question, Zona Research announces the release
of its latest Zona Market Report, XML: The Dash for Dot.com
Interoperability. This report is packed with primary research
from interviews with enterprise decision makers who are
currently deploying XML based solutions or plan to do so
during 2001. The report explores the state of XML deployments
from the users' perspective and answers these questions,
amongst others:
- Why of the 72% of respondents who use EDI, do seven
out of eight plan to convert EDI data to XML data in applications?
- Why will XML excel where EDI and Extended Intranets
have fallen short?
- How does XML fundamentally change both the speed and
cost of doing business?
- Why will the number of companies adopting RosettaNet
quadruple over the next two years?
- How does XML act as a political phenomenon and a business
process disruptor?
- Can XML become a universal data translator, and thus
a new model for finding and acquiring Web-based services?
"The problem of 'islands of computing' has been around
for decades, but without a universally-recognized means
of converting data while retaining its richness, developers
have been left with a hodge-podge of one-off, point-to-point
conversions," states Martin Marshall, Managing Director,
Zona Research. "With XML, Web applications have the
ability not just to bridge static forms, but also to separate
and standardize the business processes that various industries
will use to act upon that data." Marshall also notes
that, ironically, some of the biggest gains brought by
XML will be political. "To get the most out of XML,
vertical industries will have to agree to standardize processes
and definitions, a process which itself will be a potentially
great leap forward."
News Tidbits (appears every day on the front page)
- no tidbits today.
