W3C announced the advancement of “XForms 1.0” to Proposed Recommendation. Comments are welcome through 29 August. More flexible than previous HTML and XHTML form technologies, the new generation of Web forms separates purpose, presentation, and data. The XForms specification is written for authors and implementers alike. Visit the XForms home page. www.w3.org/MarkUp/Forms
Category: Content creation and design (Page 59 of 60)
Technologies and strategies for authoring and editing, including word processors, structured editors, web and page layout and formatting, content conversion and migration, multichannel content, structured and unstructured data integration, and metadata creation.
Macromedia announced Macromedia Authorware 7. Authorware enables developers to deliver AICC/ADL-SCORM compatible courseware, and the latest version adds learning management system Knowledge Objects that make it easier to communicate between the application and the LMS. A Learning Object Content Packager helps developers organize and upload content to the LMS. The packager compiles the metadata, Authorware files and resources, and an XML manifest into an ADL SCORM-compatible zip file. The product imports and exports XML to create data-driven applications, supports JavaScript to enable additional programming depth, and enables all product properties to be scripted, allowing developers to create commands, Knowledge Objects, and extensible content. Macromedia Authorware 7 is available as both a standalone product or as part of the Macromedia eLearning Suite. Authorware 7 is expected to ship later this month for Windows 98, SE, Me, NT 4, 2000, and XP. The product is priced at $2,999 for new users, $399 to upgrade from Authorware 6.5, and $899 to upgrade from Authorware 5.x and 6.0, with educational pricing at $499. www.macromedia.com/go/aw7
Arbortext, Inc. announced Arbortext 5. Featuring three major new products and many enhancements, Arbortext 5 is designed to help medium and large enterprises eliminate the substantial costs and pain associated with the implementation of content systems to create and share information. This new version provides the business user with direct access to XML content across the enterprise, which protects document integrity and enables them to quickly and easily create applications for publishing dynamic content to multiple types of media. Additionally, Arbortext 5 augments the XML editing capabilities of the Enterprise and Professional versions of Microsoft Office 2003. Contributor, Styler and DCA Manager are the three new products that will be available with Arbortext 5. The Arbortext 5 product suite will be available Winter, 2003. www.arbortext.com
Altova Inc. announced that their XML document editor product, AUTHENTIC 5, will now be offered to the public through a free software license. AUTHENTIC 5 is a customizable, light-weight, and easy-to-use XML document editor, that allows business users to create and edit content through a web-enabled interface that resembles a word processor. AUTHENTIC 5 features full support for standard internet protocols and file transfer interfaces, including WebDAV, HTTP; a browser plug-in that enables a business user to access and edit XML content on the Web, spell checking capabilities in 14 languages including a medical & legal dictionary, real-time document validation, built-in templates for over 15 industry standard XMLcontent formats including NewsML, NITF, DocBook, and more. AUTHENTIC 5 can be used in conjunction with XML content repositories, including OracleXML DB, Microsoft CMS 2002 via the AUTHENTIC Content Management Server Placeholder Control Edition, Microsoft SQL Server 2000, Software AG Tamino Server, IXIASOFT TextML Server, XML Global GoXML DB, Lightspeed Interactive Astoria, X-Hive/DB, iLevel Software Insite Server, NeoCore XMS, and others. www.altova.com/download
The World Wide Web Consortium has issued Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) as a W3C Candidate Recommendation. Advancement of the document to Candidate Recommendation is an invitation to the Web development community at large to make implementations of SVG and provide technical feedback. Web designers have requirements for graphics formats which display well on a range of different devices, screen sizes, and printer resolutions. They need rich graphical capabilities, good internationalization, responsive animation and interactive behavior in a way that takes advantage of the growing XML infrastructure used in e-commerce, publishing, and B2B communication.
Web designers demand vendor-neutral, cross-platform interoperability. SVG brings the advantages of XML to the world of vector graphics. It enables the textual content of graphics – from logos to diagrams – to be searched, indexed, and displayed in multiple languages. This is a significant benefit for both accessibility and internationalization. Related W3C specifications such as the Document Object Model (DOM) allow for easy server-side generation and dynamic, client-side modification of graphics and text. SVG also benefits from W3C technologies such as CSS and XSL style sheets, RDF metadata, SMIL Animation and XML Linking. In addition to being an excellent format for stand-alone graphics, the full power of SVG is seen when it is combined with other XML grammars; for example to deliver multimedia applications, hold business data, or render mathematical expressions. Bringing the XML advantage to vector graphics benefits all industries that depend on rich graphics delivery – advertising, electronic commerce, process control, mapping, financial services, and education all have immediate needs for SVG.
The SVG Working Group consists of key industry and research players including, in alphabetical order: Adobe Systems, AOL/Netscape, Apple, Autodesk, Canon, Corel, CSIRO, Eastman Kodak, Excosoft, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, ILOG, IntraNet Systems, Macromedia, Microsoft, OASIS, Opera, Oxford Brookes University, Quark, Sun Microsystems, and Xerox. www.w3.org
The Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI), an organization leading the development of international standards to improve electronic resource management and information discovery, announced the formal recommendation of the Dublin Core (DC) Qualifiers. The addition of the DC Qualifiers enhances the semantic precision of the existing DC Metadata Element Set. The DC Qualifiers build upon the DC Metadata Element Set, which provides 15 categories to describe resources on the Web – a catalog card with new dimensions. Known as the Dublin Core, the metadata model has become the de facto standard for description of information on the Internet. For the past year, working groups of the Dublin Core developed these newly agreed upon refinements to the catalog card to give better access to information we seek. In essence, the new recommendations for Dublin Core Qualifiers increase the effectiveness of metadata by giving it finer granularity. For example, a publication’s date, which would be the Dublin Core Metadata Element, may be further detailed as a particular type of date by using a Dublin Core Qualifier such as date last modified, date created, or date issued. The DC Qualifiers improve interpretation of metadata values and can be easily recorded or transferred into HTML, XML, RDF or relational databases. The evolution of DC Qualifiers draws from the input of many individuals across a broad array of disciplines. Users include museum informatics specialists, archivists, digital library researchers, libraries, and government information providers and a variety of content providers. Their efforts have led standards organizations, such as NISO (National Information Standards Organization) in the U.S. and CEN in Europe (European Committee for Standardization) to view the DC Metadata Element Set as a benchmark candidate for simple resource description on the Internet. More recently, new sectors, such as education and industry, have been attracted to Dublin Core’s simplicity, multilingual scope, consensus philosophy and widespread adoption. http://purl.org/dc/documents/dcmes-qualifiers, http://purl.org/dc/
SoftQuad Software, Ltd. and Vignette Corporation announced that they have partnered to provide e-businesses with a comprehensive platform for implementing and deploying XML-based content solutions. Through the integration of SoftQuad’s XMetaL content-creation platform, and the Vignette V/5 eBusiness Platform, businesses can now leverage the use of XML technology. This partnership allows for the deployment of Web-based solutions that capture content from a wide variety of sources and integrate it with both internal and external systems. SoftQuad Software has become a Vignette Technology Partner and will also become a Vignette V2B Services partner. Vignette V2B Services streamline the process of purchasing, implementing and using e-business applications. Vignette V2B Services are provided via the Vignette V2B MarketPlace and Vignette V2B Communities. The integration of the two products gives e-businesses the ability to efficiently create and work with XML documents within a productive workflow environment, enabling the delivery of personalized content that attracts customers and builds successful e-relationships more quickly than ever before. With XMetaL’s word processor-like interface, more people within an organization can quickly create content directly in XML, or convert documents from other formats including Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel, into XML. Content creators can then save XML documents directly within the Vignette V/5 eBusiness Platform production workflow. To further streamline the approval and revision process, XML content can be retrieved and submitted to Vignette’s Web-based workflow management interface or directly from within XMetaL. The transparency of the integration dramatically decreases the costs associated with providing an XML content solution and accelerates the speed with which e-businesses can deliver customized content to their customers. www.vignette.com, www.softquad.com
SoftQuad Software, Ltd. announced MarketAgility, an XML-based content solution that gives businesses more power and control over the creation, management and real-time delivery of product information to e-marketplaces and e-procurement systems. MarketAgility provides suppliers with an efficient and cost-effective way to move product information from their enterprises to multiple electronic distribution channels. MarketAgility 1.0, formerly code named Global OnRamp, is scheduled for release in September, 2000. Suppliers until now have had trouble collecting their product information, which has generally been located in disparate sources throughout their enterprises. It’s also been difficult to translate that information into the various distinct formats required by different e-marketplaces. Even after these initial barriers have been overcome, suppliers have still found it hard to maintain up-to-date product and pricing information and to target and differentiate their products across multiple distribution channels. MarketAgility lets suppliers quickly leverage their existing infrastructure and business processes to collect product information from wherever it resides in the enterprise, whether in content management systems, electronic resource planning systems, enterprise databases, or Microsoft Word or Excel files. It then automatically delivers this information in a format that is fully customized for different e-markets in their specific dialect of XML. In addition, MarketAgility allows suppliers to maintain their competitive advantage by rapidly and incrementally updating product and pricing information across all channels. MarketAgility is comprised of three major components: the MarketAgility XML Connector, the MarketAgility XML Server, and the MarketAgility XML Transporter. MarketAgility also incorporates SoftQuad’s XMetaL technology, an enabler for XML content applications. MarketAgility allows content revisions to be made directly within XML. Suppliers can now easily supplement their product data with rich content and better differentiate themselves in e-markets. MarketAgility supports common industry standards such as BizTalk, W3C Schemas, xCBL and cXML. www.softquad.com
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