All posts by : Between the Lines

151 of 173 | Enabling Government Web Services - Jim Willis, the chief geek in the Rhode Island Secretary of State`s office, has a vision for government data: "It is simply unacceptable at this point in history that a citizen can use web services to track the movies he is renting, the weather around his house, and the books he`s recently [...]...

152 of 173 | SOA tool bundle is Sybase`s first major Eclipse foray - Looking to catch a ride on the Eclipse train -- a train that appears to be taking off and going right past its rival NetBeans  -- Sybase is, at JavaOne, introducing an integrated bundle of tools called WorkSpace that will plug into the Eclipse integrated development environment (IDE).  According to Sybase`s director [...]...

153 of 173 | Are you ready for Inescapable Data - Chris Stakutis, IBM`s CTO for emerging storage software, says all businesses are confronting three major tech trends: the phenomenal growth of data; the proliferation of wireless connectivity; and the rise of XML, or self-describing data. He`s coined a term for the result. Stakutis calls it "inescapable data." He even wrote a book about it, Inescapable [...]...

154 of 173 | Oracle to set SOA techs free at JavaOne - For several years now, Oracle, with its own Java-based J2EE application server and integrated development environment  (JDeveloper), has been trying to play in the same league as Java application server heavyweights IBM and BEA.  But despite having traditionally positioned itself as the low cost provider of world class tools, the software vendor known mostly [...]...

155 of 173 | Microsoft XML technologies and patents drawing fire from multiple quarters - The recently announced XML-based file formats for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint -- formats that Microsoft has claimed to be "open" -- are getting some heat for not only pushing the boundaries on the definition of open, but also for the validity of the patents behind them.   In addition, the patents behind other Microsoft XML [...]...

156 of 173 | Public discourse under way over definition of "open" - I`ve been taking some time to digest the open vs. closed discussion (the context being Microsoft`s new XML document format for Word, Excel and PowerPoint) that`s taking place in various corners of the blogosphere.  IBM`s Bob Sutor, whose blog is entitled Open standards, open source, open minds, open opportunities, has been picking up on most [...]...

157 of 173 | BEA floats along with all SOA boats - BEA just spent millions of dollars to develop and market a concept and a brand that will remake the company’s image. The concept, Think Liquid, and the brand, AquaLogic, “unifies what we do for a living…to bring customers simplicity and fluidity in enterprise computing,” said company co-founder and CEO Alfred Chuang during the rollout event [...]...

158 of 173 | BEA reinvents itself as the `Switzerland` of SOA - For many years, the phrase "Java application server" was synonymous with BEA’s Weblogic Java 2 Enteprise Edition-based offering.  The company established a significant first-mover advantage in the J2EE space and BEA was one of the darlings of Wall Street.  But the competition stiffened and now, although research methodology is always a subject of controversy, IBM [...]...

159 of 173 | InfoCard and Web Services - Over at the IT Garage, Doc Searls goes through some history of Microsoft`s InfoCard initiative and asks some good questions.  InfoCard is an identity metasystem that Doc correctly describes as a "barn raising project" led by Microsoft.  Kim Cameron, Microsoft`s chief identity architect believes that Microsoft has an important role to play in enabling identity, [...]...

160 of 173 | Mac Office 12 and .xml - In my coverage of primary Office 12 apps defaulting to XML file formats (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx) I didn`t have the scoop on Mac Office 12. Here`s what`s happening according to Rick Schaut, who should know...Just in case you`re wondering about the story with Mac Office 12, Mac Office 12 will support the new file formats as well. Also, [...]...

161 of 173 | Office 12 defaulting to .XML file format - Chris Capossela, who runs product management for the Office family of products, dropped by to see me to dribble out more details about the next version of Microsoft Office (currently dubbed "12"), which is due in the second half of 2006. The important revelation, which was expected, is that some Office 12 applications (Word, Excel [...]...

162 of 173 | Spreading the .NET surface area - Mary Jo Foley recently blew the lid off Longhorn`s "Dirty Little Secret." Longhorn isn`t going to be based on the .NET Framework, as we all thought. Only a fraction of the total would be written for .NET (Avalon and Indigo), leaving the majority of the operating system as native code. Unfortunately, I don`t think there was [...]...

163 of 173 | Desperately seeking: More AJAX developers - If you`re a developer or a developer-wanna-be and you`re trying to catch the next big lucrative wave of programming, I`m convinced that AJAX (aka: Asynchronous Javascript + XML) is it. This morning, I was reminded of why.  More on that in a second.  The best description of AJAX that I`ve found comes from Adaptive [...]...

164 of 173 | Grasshopper hops code from Visual Studio .Net to Linuxfor free - Mainsoft launched a free Visual Studio .Net plug-in called Grasshopper and a developer community forum for creating Web applications and Web services that run on Linux, Windows and Java platforms. Formally titled Visual MainWin for J2EE Developer Edition, Grasshopper benefits from two years of collaboration by Mainsoft and the Mono team on Mono`s ASP.NET, ADO.NET, XML, [...]...

165 of 173 | The reality of Web services - Andrew McAfee, an associate professor in the technology and operations management unit at Harvard Business School, has been studying who uses Web services and why. More interesting, perhaps, are his insights into why using Web services remains hard. In a recent article in HBS Working Knowledge, Sara Grant interviewed McAfee. McAfee says [...]...

166 of 173 | No more tricks left for RSS That depends. - Steve Gillmor is back on "the air" again.   Under the name the "Gillmor Daily," Gillmor`s new regular gig featured Dave Winer (credited with the birth or rebirth of the XML-RPC, RSS, podcasting, and OPML) for the first show and based on what is said near the show`s end, Winer will be making regular appearances.   [...]...

167 of 173 | All about Infocard - By the end of this month Microsoft`s will be releasing a "technical preview" of InfoCard, a new framework for managing identities based on WS-* protocols. Microsoft is also rolling out other related technologies for federation. It`s a big deal if the industry can come up with a generally agreed upon, open approach to dealing with the [...]...

168 of 173 | Microsofts enlightened identity metasystem - On the final day of Digital ID World 2005, John Shewchuk, CTO for distributed systems at Microsoft, and Kim Cameron, identity and access architect at Microsoft, outlined their company`s plan for delivering a unifying identity metasystem, an abstraction layer, based on WS-* Web services technology. "The essential concept of the metasystem is you have a bunch [...]...

169 of 173 | Converging federation standards - Key members of the federated identity specification and standards gangs—OASIS, Liberty Alliance and the IBM/Microsoft led WS-* --met at Digital ID World 2005 today to discuss their different approaches to deriving specifications and the possibility of convergence.Moderator Mike Neuenschwander of the Burton Group tried to locate any sensitive areas among the different parties, represented by George [...]...

170 of 173 | Globus Toolkit 4.0 - The Globus Consortium unleashed the version 4.0 of the Globus Toolkit (GT4), which is a key component for accelerating the adoption of enterprise-class grids. Developed by the Globus Alliance,  the open source GT4 is the latest iteration rendered from a decade of development. The main enhancement from version 3.0 is marrying grid protocols with Web services. GT4 includes support for  Web [...]...

171 of 173 | Why youll join the Longhorn evolution - Molly Wood, senior editor of CNET.com, recently asked why people would bother to upgrade to Longhorn when Avalon and Indigo will be available to WinXP/2003 users, and WinFS has been deferred entirely. In her article, she concludes that "Windows is weak," leaving the door open for competitors to eat Microsoft`s lunch. It won`t be an [...]...

172 of 173 | Why youll join the Longhorn evolution - Molly Wood, senior editor of CNET.com, recently asked why people would bother to upgrade to Longhorn when Avalon and Indigo will be available to WinXP/2003 users, and WinFS has been deferred entirely. In her article, she concludes that "Windows is weak," leaving the door open for competitors to eat Microsoft`s lunch. It won`t be an [...]...

173 of 173 | Monty Python on the Semantic Web - Tony Byrne of CMS Watch sent me a note about a fun series of posts over at the xml-dev mailing list using Monty Python to poke fun at the Semantic Web, RESTful Web Services, and Web Services specifications.  Its worth reading the comments in between the quips as well.  ...