Quantcast
The MFWire
Manage Email Alerts | Sponsorships | About MFWire | Who We Are

Subscribe to MFWire.com's News Alerts [click]

Rating:Why XML Matters Not Rated 3.0 Email Routing List Email & Route  Print Print
Friday, January 21, 2000

Why XML Matters
Guest Column by: Andrew Lapsely

Andrew Lapsely is a managing director of Insource Technology in New York and a frequent speaker at industry conferences, with 5 years experience in the e-commerce sector and 10 years experience in the tech sector.

About 30 years ago, my Dad and my Uncle had a great idea. With a warehouse full of classical titles printed in Esperanto, they made plans to retire rich men after selling the books all over the world. Nowadays, when Dad brags about his career (other than this publishing venture, he had a remarkably successful one for the penniless immigrant he was when he landed on these shores), I ask him how the book sales are going. "You know, we still move a coupla those books a year," he says.

Related Links
Insource Technology
On InvestmentWires
  E-Commerce: It s Not a Silver Bullet
Dec 28 1999
  It s All In the Data
Dec 15 1999
  Why Your Business is Like Pizza Hut
Nov 9 1999
 Electronic Commerce and the Mutual Fund Industry
Aug 12 1999
I tell this story to make a point. Going back in time, back to the Tower of Babel, men have always tried to unite a variety of tongues on one common playing field. (Editor's Note -- Can they do that?) A lingua franca -- common language -- if you will. Esperanto was a twentieth century attempt to solve this exact problem.

In the computer world, there have been many similar attempts. The desire to allow disparate systems to communicate has been around since the '60s. More Esperantos than you can shake a stick at have been proposed, promised as the Holy Grail, partially adopted and ultimately ignored.

This brings us to XML, the eXtensible Markup Language. Actually, it's less of a language and more of a syntax for describing data. Sounds like just another Esperanto, you say. I say not, and for these reasons. Like its sibling HTML, XML is a subset of a language that has been around for years: SGML, the Standard Generalized Markup Language. Back before the Web, people used SGML to mark up documents, to convey their ultimate look and feel with descriptions, rather than embedded codes in an electronic file.

While XML is useful in several ways, one of the ways it has proven most useful is as an exchange mechanism for data between different e-commerce systems. Essentially, XML allows you to specify the tags you use to format, describe and deliver the data, and then to deliver the data wrapped in the tags you have specified. The table of contents, if you will, is the DTD, or Data Type Definition. The concept of tacking a header file to a bunch of data certainly isn't new, but what makes XML special is the acceptance and industry-wide adoption of it as a standard and as a mechanism for data interchange.

Rewind back to the ate 80's. EDI, or Electronic Data Interchange, arrived as the latest Esperanto to allow multiple, disparate systems to talk to each other, specifically focusing on the coordination of manufacturing, supply chain, fulfillment and accounting data. EDI had great promise. And a number of companies jumped on the bandwagon. (Many still have their EDI solutions in place, and are very happy.) The promise of EDI was interconnectivity, but the failure, at least in terms of global adoption, was that it ultimately became a balkanized, vendor specific morass, with several private flavors of EDI emerging. There was no clear leader in the field to set one over-arching standard.

Will this happen to XML? In a word ... No. Remember when I said what sets XML apart is the acceptance and industry- wide adoption of it as a standard? That's what will ultimately make it as universal as HTML. Seems like the technologists got this one right! Here's the best part about XML. Instead of being locked into proprietary application solutions, several per application, XML variants are emerging along industry lines. Why? Mainly because, with the explosion of electronic commerce, and the massive amounts of data throughput needed to feed the beast called the World Wide Web, people have demanded and received a way to move data quickly and efficiently.

With the proliferation of open source solutions, XML has developed as an open standard, with the only variations along Industry rather than vendor channels. And more importantly, the very configurability and nature of XML means that as long as you manage the syntax right, any variant is compliant with the rapidly merging toolsets.

In our industry, a variant of XML called IFX is emerging as the standard that several companies will build to. But again, the standard comes from a consortium, not a vendor. So ultimately, the total cost of development will stay low. And as more companies adopt the standard, data throughput between systems will become as ubiquitous as e-mail, and also as easy. Trade settlement, record keeping, equity and bond market making, fund transfer agency processing. The list of data-driven processes that will ultimately benefit is almost endless. In our industry, what matters is moving, massaging and communicating the data. And I guarantee you, XML will make that a lot easier and ultimately cheaper!

So remember you heard it here first. XML matters and XML will rapidly become the data interchange standard that matters on the World Wide Web.

***
As I write this column, I plan on giving you technology-centric updates from the trenches. Our clients include several of this nations largest asset managers, servicing mutual fund investors, as well as institutional and pension clients on the Internet. As I work in these areas, I get a birds-eye view of what technology really matters in the fast-paced world where technology, investors and our industry meet. If you have any requests, I would love to hear them. Send them to me at drewl@insource.com.


The views presented in this article represent those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of InvestmentWires, Inc. InvestmentWires, Inc. does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness or timeliness of, or otherwise endorse, these views, opinions or recommendations, give investment advice, or advocate the purchase or sale of any security or investment.  





Stay ahead of the news ... Sign up for our email alerts now
CLICK HERE

3.0
 Do You Recommend This Story?



GO TO: MFWire
Return to Top
 News Archives
2024: Q2Q1
2023: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2022: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2021: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2020: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2019: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2018: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2017: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2016: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2015: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2014: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2013: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2012: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2011: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2010: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2009: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2008: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2007: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2006: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2005: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2004: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2003: Q4Q3Q2Q1
2002: Q4Q3Q2Q1
 Subscribe via RSS:
Raw XML
Add to My Yahoo!
follow us in feedly




©All rights reserved to InvestmentWires, Inc. 1997-2024
14 Wall Street | 20th Floor | New York, NY 10005 | P: 212-331-8968 | F: 212-331-8998
Privacy Policy :: Terms of Use