Enterprise Data Access Using XML.

Since XML came into being in 1998, its influence has spread like wildfire. People expect it to bring EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) to e-commerce, solve stubborn database information exchange problems, wed dissimilar information repositories, unify divergent enterprise application systems, and revolutionize Web access to everything from medical diagnostic records to currency exchange information. The hype surrounding it is deafening, but XML is more than the product of an overreaching publicity campaign. It is real-- and it is important.

XML on its own cannot provide the answer to anything. But as a vehicle for conveying electronic information, it is unsurpassed. The problem is how to prime XML conduits with enterprise data. Businesses seeking to exploit the potential of the Internet need a way to construct an economical bridge between their diverse, and often chaotic, data assets and the XML channels that, in time, will line the information superhighway. It is there that EDA middleware -- with its unique ability to wed disparate software technologies -- can work its magic.

Enterprise Data Access which began in 1991 as a SQL client/server middleware product offering revolutionary data access capabilities has undergone four generations of change since its introduction. It is valuable today because it provides truly universal data access, accommodates every transport mechanism, runs everywhere, bridges competing component architectures, and scales gracefully. Its mission, which at one time was simply to transform arbitrary, heterogeneous collections of distributed data into textbook SQL databases, now encompasses nearly every aspect of modern distributed computing. EDA has become an amalgam of products, services, and capabilities that work invisibly to resolve technological gaps and inconsistencies. This paper introduces EDA/XML, a new strategic solution based on Information Builders' EDA middleware and the new EDA/XML Connector. This solution will combines EDAs ability to make data of any type and structure accessible, with the data transportability potential of (XML). XML in isolation is little more than an academic curiosity. However coupled with a coherent data source it is a force to be reckoned with. EDA/XML fulfills an important need by channelling data controlled by any mix of data stores, any CICS or IMSI/M system, and any ERP system, through XML. EDA Servers come with adapters for 80 disparate data sources and run wherever significant data assets are found. With an EDA/XML Connector in place, EDA Servers can provide the crucial link between a corporate data repository (regardless of how diverse and disorganized it may seem) and the rest of the digital universe

More than the internet needed.

If you approach the Internet with a view to improving business speed and efficiency, you know that your ability to access, manipulate, and exchange data matters more than anything.

Competitive advantage begins and ends with data. That is why companies expend so much energy capturing information about everything from the operational data that keeps them going, to the analytical data they use to make better decisions, and the predictive data that helps them anticipate change. The slogan `Information is power' means that something real derives from the ability to capture, access, and use data, for the right purpose, at the right time. Enterprise-wide data access, however, is difficult to achieve. A generation before the World Wide Web made inter-enterprise collaboration a business imperative, companies collected data piecemeal, in independent databases and files designed to support specific user communities or to suit special-purpose requirements. As a result of design decisions made long before the Internet arrived, much of the data companies need to pursue their i-business objectives at the present time is virtually inaccessible. More often than not, it can be found locked within arcane database and file stores or shielded behind application and transaction processing systems that make data access and reuse impractical. While the Internet, in theory, is a unifying technology, it does not provide a solution to the data access and reuse problems that continue to plague the IT industry. `The business speed and efficiency that the Internet is supposed to provide can be achieved only in the presence of a software bridge linking new applications to inaccessible islands of data.

Costly custom software bridges are not the answer. They are too expensive, too technically demanding, too risky, and much too time-consuming to build. That is why analysts recommend software integration technologies like EDA/XML to link the Internet word with the maddening hodgepodge of incompatible data sources that most businesses have managed to assemble over the years.

Bridging the Data Exchange Gap

The revolutionary benefit the Internet provides is connectivity. By connecting people to information and institutions to institutions, the Internet has become a ubiquitous facilitator of business collaboration. It is not without its weaknesses, however. HTML, its prime information delivery vehicle, controls computer screen displays, but has little, if anything, to say about content, and content matters most in the digital universe that awaits us.

The IT industry has long sought a means for conveying self-descriptive data. Until recently, efforts in this area were not particularly fruitful. First of all, IT managers lacked the wherewithal to link their systems with those of other companies. Second, the technical issues involved were formidable. Everyone knew it would take teams of experts years to define the formats and protocols required for effective inter-program communication. The problem was left exclusively to the experts, who constructed a highly complex solution (SGML) geared to their own needs and aesthetic preferences.

The Internet removed the first barrier to progress by connecting everyone to everyone else. XML, which is a highly simplified version of SGML designed with practical applications in mind, will soon remove the second. HTML succeeded because it made it possible for ordinary people with something to say to disseminate information over the Web in a form that other ordinary people could understand. In the same way, XML will succeed because it makes it possible for ordinary developers to create document formatting standards that other ordinary developers can understand and use.

That's the reason why XML is enormously important. Internet-connected applications and devices need to interpret and manipulate data as well as display it, and they can do little with HTML documents except display them. XML documents, however, are self-descriptive. They contain, in a prologue known as a Document Type Definition (DTD) or Schema, the key to unravelling their structure and information content. The self-descriptive aspect of XML makes it easy for any receiver to deconstruct incoming XML documents and messages. Application programs, database management and file management systems, text pagers, cellular telephones, and Web browsers can make sense of XML documents because the rules for interpreting DTDs and Schemes are well-known.

XML is not a software product. It is a standard established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). As such, it can help bridge the exchange gap between connected software environments. But it can only help. Bridging the gap requires more than a data formatting standard -- it requires a combination of data access middleware and various XML-aware software components to support data-exchange applications.

Data access middleware is an indispensable framework for this process because it makes data readily accessible and reusable. Throughout the past decade, such middleware has proven to be a cost-effective, reliable, and manageable alternative to the customized, special-purpose data bridges that are otherwise necessary to access and manipulate captive data. By contrast, data- access middleware serves as a general-purpose bridge for linking users and application programs on the one hand with disparate database, file, and packaged application environments on the other. It masks low-level details (e.g., data location, file structure, etc.) and provides a unified, SQL view of distributed, heterogeneous collections of data.

When middleware supports XML transportability, it becomes a more powerful and cost- effective solution than before. With XML, data access middleware bridges the exchange gap that impedes i-business speed and efficiency.

EDA/XML

In 1991, Information Builders launched EDA/SQL middleware, providing a way to deliver captive data to a new generation of desktop tools. Now, with EDA/XML, it has a way to deliver captive data to e-commerce applications lining the information highway. In a sense, this is history repeating itself but, given the revolutionary nature of the Internet, EDA/XML promises to be an even more important technological contribution than EDA/SQL..

EDA/XML combines XML data transportability with EDAs ability to liberate data locked within over 80 proprietary DBMSs and legacy files, within proprietary transaction processing environments, and within packaged application systems provided by companies such as SAP and PeopleSoft.

EDA/XML makes captive data readily accessible, reusable, and exchangeable by making ludicious use of the XML standard. Business enterprises seeking improved speed and efficiency through i-business will be able to implement fully integrated business-to-consumer, business-to-business, and supply-chain solutions using XML as a base. By making heretofore inaccessible data available to Web applications, Web browsers, and other connected business computing devices in a form that can be understood, EDA/XML makes it possible for established companies to use existing data assets as a weapon in their approval.

EDA/XML in operation

EDA/XML extends Information Builders' EDA Middleware by channeling into XML data controlled by any mix of DBMSs and tile stores, and any CICS, IMS/TM, or ERP system. With EDA Servers providing an infrastructure for data access and manipulation, and the EDA/XML Connector providing the link between the EDA infrastructure and XML-based applications, the prospects for ecommerce improve dramatically.

The EDA/XML Connector functions like an XML Integration Server. It mediates between business processes (or HTML pages operating on Web-enabled devices) and one or more EDA Servers operating on the back-end that service data. The connector accepts command streams expressed in XML and produces results expressed as well-formed XML documents. The diagram below depicts the EDA/XML Connector in action:

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The EDA/XML Connector commences work when a request document encoded to the EDA/XML DTD specification arrives. It passes the document to an external security system. (Rather than imposing security policies on application systems, the EDA/XML Connector works seamlessly within any security environment.) The security system decrypts the request, and the connector hands the decrypted request over to its built-in XML parser/validator. The parser/validator recasts the decrypted request as an in-memory structure and loads the designated EDA Connection Agent for this message type. The EDA/XML Connector provides standard agents for processing SQL statements, FOCUS Table and Maintain requests, and stored procedure calls (invoking the services of application programs sited elsewhere in the network). The agent examines the data prepared by the parser/validator and, from it, extracts a request, which it then routes to an EDA Server for processing. When the Server responds, the agent emits one or more well-formed XML Output documents. Finally, the Connector distributes this output to selected XML-capable recipients.

Tech Note

EDA/XML Connector Specification

The EDA/XML Connector delivers a number of important capabilities. Specifically:

* XML Input. Any XML-capable i-business application or tool can use the connector to access the data and applications made available by EDA. The documented EDA/XML Document Type Definition (DTD) facilitates express stored procedure calls, SQL statements, FOCUS Table specifications, and Maintain procedures.

Advantages: Supports access to 80 DBMSs or files, CICS and IMS/TM transaction applications, and MRP systems; reduces custom DTD development; speeds system deployment; simplifies coding and maintenance.

* Automatic Request Conversion. The EDA/XML Connector converts XML requests into a form that any EDA Server can process.

Advantages: Enhances the data access, transaction integration, and ERP integration capabilities that EDA supports; eliminates custom data and application bridges;

XML Output. Generates machine-readable output. (The connector automatically recasts EDA Server output as well-formed XML documents that any XML-aware application can digest or render on a display screen.)

Advantages: Machine-readable output makes the connector especially useful in workflow applications and applications in which pagers, cellular telephones, and other handheld devices play a role. Output documents may be rendered differently by differing output devices, eliminating processing overhead and network contention for applications that cater to diverse audiences.

Programmable Agents. The EDA/XML Connector, in addition to providing a complete library of standard connection agents, makes it possible for customers to develop custom agents. A simple API enables this.

Advantages: Extends applicability -- EDA/XML is useful in any i-business context.

* Security Interface. EDA/XML places system security in the hands of a plug-in module. While EDA provides a starter module suitable for many security contexts, users may wish to integrate the EDA/XML Connector into their own enterprise-wide security solution. A simple API makes this easy to accomplish.

Advantages: Makes for flexible, uniform, system-wide security.

* Messaging and Queuing. The EDA/XML Connector can operate either synchronously (over IP protocols) or asynchronously. In asynchronous mode, the connector relies on IBM MQSeries for messaging and queuing support.

Advantages: Makes fail-safe interconnection and guaranteed message delivery a reality; provides end-user convenience and improved throughput, availability, and scalability; supports workflow applications.

* Web Input/XML Output. In addition to XML document input, the EDA/XML Connector accepts input from any Web page.

Advantages: Opens the system to a broader range of end users; accommodates a variety of devices, ranging from cellular telephones to pagers and other handheld appliances.

* Message Routing. The EDA/XML Connector can direct its output to other applications, EDA Servers, Web browsers, e-mall systems (via SMTP), and selected display devices.

Advantages: Expands the reach of Internet applications -- EDA/XML can deliver results wherever they are needed.

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