A broad coalition of business and technology companies announced the Universal Description, Discovery and Integration (UDDI) Project, a cross-industry initiative designed to accelerate and broaden B2B integration and commerce on the Internet. American Express Co., Andersen Consulting, Ariba Inc., Bowstreet, Cargill Inc., Clarus Corp., Commerce One Inc., CommerceQuest Inc., Compaq Computer Corp., CrossWorlds Software Inc., Dell Computer Corp., Descartes, Extricity Software Inc., Fujitsu Ltd., Great Plains, i2, IBM Corp., Internet Capital Group, Loudcloud Inc., match21, Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc., Microsoft Corp., NEON, Nortel Networks Corp., NTT Communications Corp., Rational Software Corp., RealNames Corp., Sabre Holdings Corp., SAP AG, Sun Microsystems Inc., TIBCO Software Inc., Ventro Corp., Versata Inc., VeriSign, VerticalNet Inc. and webMethods Inc. are among the first to endorse and collaborate on UDDI. Growth of B2B commerce on the Internet faces challenges in scaling to universal adoption due to the multitude of technologies and standards used by businesses and e-marketplaces. UDDI will address these challenges by providing two things: First, UDDI defines a platform-neutral set of specifications to enable businesses to describe themselves and indicate their preferred means of conducting e-commerce transactions. Second, UDDI includes the shared operation of a globally distributed UDDI Business Registry. Through the UDDI Business Registry, companies publish information describing how they conduct commerce and search for other businesses that provide the capabilities, Web services or products they need. The goal of the UDDI Project is to offer the basic infrastructure for dynamic, automated integration of all e-commerce transactions and Web services. Similar to the impact HTML had for consumers on the Internet by providing a common Web site publishing format that fueled the Internet explosion, UDDI aims to make business-to-business commerce adoption universal by providing businesses with a common mechanism to publish Web services on the Internet. The UDDI Project is an open industry initiative in which any organization can participate and implement the specifications. The specifications build on core Internet standards — including TCP/IP, HTML and XML — and are independent of any underlying platform, language, object model, business application or marketplace. It is the intention of the UDDI members to transition the specifications to an industry standards body in the next 18 months. The open draft of the UDDI specification can be found at www.uddi.org. The final specification will be available shortly after public comments and feedback are incorporated. The UDDI Business Registry provides an implementation of the UDDI specification. Any company can access the registry on the Internet, enter the description of its business, reach a UDDI site, or search through all business services listed in the UDDI registry. There is no cost to access information in the registry. Although based on XML, the registry can also describe services implemented using HTML, Java, CORBA, Microsoft Windows DNA, or any other type of programming model or language. The registry is implemented as a Web service and thus can be discovered, integrated and programmatically invoked using XML like any other Web service. Beta implementations of the UDDI Business Registry will be available from Ariba, IBM and Microsoft within 30 days. These implementations will interoperate with each other, ensuring that information registered at one site is shared with all other operator registries. Other interoperable implementations are expected in the future. www.uddi.org
Category: Content technology news (Page 486 of 627)
Curated information technology news for content technology, computing, and digital experience professionals. News items are edited to remove hype, unhelpful jargon, iffy statements, and quotes, to create a short summary — mostly limited to 200 words — of the important facts with a link back to a useful source for more information. News items are published using the date of the original source here and in our weekly email newsletter.
We focus on product news, but also include selected company news such as mergers and acquisitions and meaningful partnerships. All news items are edited by one of our analysts under the NewsShark byline. See our Editorial Policy.
Note that we also publish news on X/Twitter. Follow us @gilbane
Documentum announced enhancements to DocControl Manager (DCM), a controlled content services option for their content management platform, Documentum 4i eBusiness Edition. Specifically, the enhancements to DCM ensure the authenticity of electronic content and the integrity of business processes associated with content creation, validation and approval, management, and distribution — key requirements in meeting the compliance demands of securities regulations, food and drug regulations, environmental agencies, patent regulations, and international quality standards. Typical controlled content expedited with the product include standard operating procedures (SOPs), specification sheets, Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDSs), and engineering change notices (ECNs). Companies can now provide secured access to the most current versions of controlled content at any specified location. This is achieved using a defined change management process to assure the content is always reviewed and approved by the appropriate personnel. The solution also ensures that content release is always a consistent, tightly managed, and documented process. In addition, DCM will now integrate with Documentum’s Content Authentication Services, another add-on to 4i eBusiness Edition, to support electronic signatures and generate detailed audit trails for the creation, modification and approval of controlled content. The new product also provides centralized print control functionality, like restricting printing, tracking printed copies, and enabling recall of printed copies. www.documentum.com
BroadVision and H&Q Asia Pacific announced the formation of a new company, a Business Services Provider (BSP) to deliver B2B mobile commerce (m-commerce) services to the worldwide wireless market. The joint venture is the first initiative to integrate the explosive wireless market with the global enterprise B2B market. The new company will develop and rapidly deliver a new generation of “small but smart” e-business applications and services that will integrate an enterprise with its mobile workforce and its mobile business end-users. The new company is a joint venture between BroadVision, H&Q Asia Pacific, ACCESS Co. Ltd., a supplier of browser technology for non-PC devices, including NTT DoCoMo’s i-mode phones, and ITOCHU TECHNO-SCIENCE Corporation (CTC), a system integrator and services company, and ITOCHU Corporation, the global company that promotes positive business development in the B2B and wireless fields. The venture will base its offerings on BroadVision One-To-One e-business applications and the company’s next-generation XML content management and XSL device-independent rendering technologies. The new company, tentatively named B-Mobile Corporation is slated to be established October 1, 2000 to provide a service for Internet-based business transactions via wireless networks such as mobile phones and PDAs. The company will also begin development of new applications for mobile B2B e-commerce by combining BroadVision’s technology and ACCESS’s mobile-enabled browser system for the use of client companies inside and outside Japan. The new company will be based in Chiyoda-ward, Tokyo. www.broadvision.com, www.access-us-inc.com, www.ctc-g.co.jp
Artesia Technologies, Inc., announced the release of its TEAMS 4.0 software solution. The latest version of Artesia’s digital asset management solution features increased support for streaming media applications, improved metadata management capabilities, and inclusion of new web-accessible functionality. With the addition of these features to TEAMS’ existing enterprise-class architecture and support for all types of rich media, TEAMS 4.0 provides a platform for the management and use of digital assets within the Global 2000, media, entertainment, publishing, and dot-com markets. Artesia Technologies’ TEAMS 4.0 provides a media-independent framework for the ingestion, management and re-expression of all types of digital content, including text, images, graphics, audio, video, Quark and 3-D raster images. Early releases of TEAMS 4.0 have already been in use, with general availability slated for this October. One of the principal new features of TEAMS 4.0 is its increased optimization for the management and delivery of streaming media content. Seamless integration with Virage Video Logger enables TEAMS 4.0 to automatically capture thumbnail proxies and key frames on import from Real, QuickTime, and Microsoft digital formats and easily export to these formats as well. Users will also benefit from being able to utilize multiple resolutions of a video asset while continuing to track and manage them as a single asset. In addition, the new Clip Identifier (CI) lets the user select a segment from a video storyboard and express it as a new asset. The Clip-Time Adjuster (CTA) makes it possible to manipulate video in and out points on a frame-by-frame basis. Finally, the Play Decision List (PDL) will use the XML-based SMIL recommendation to allow for selection and synchronization of parts of videos from many different sources. TEAMS 4.0 will also offer several other key enhancements, including fortification of its Web client framework through the use of standards-based J2EE JSP technology. www.artesiatech.com
Microsoft Corp. announced the next version of its Office suite and confirmed that the new product’s first technical beta has been sent to a select group of customers. The next version of Microsoft Office will be a major product release and will be the first Office suite to begin delivering on the Office.NET vision by integrating Internet-based services, enabling users to be more productive using Office with the Web. New features include: Smart Tags that appear on the screen while individuals work, providing useful information for completing tasks or accessing data; New Task Panes offer views that expose a wide range of new and popular features; Speech recognition; Hotmail and MSN Instant Messenger integration; Word Count toolbar; Application and document recovery; Document routing for review; Team workspaces; Excel and Access now support XML as a native file format and can easily import and export XML data; Extensible Smart Tag architecture; New tools for workflow and collaboration (“Tahoe”); and improved Web Components that enable Excel users to easily publish interactive Web pages that have data contained in spreadsheets, pivot tables and pivot charts. www.microsoft.com
IKON Office Solutions announced that it has formed a strategic relationship with IntraNet Solutions, Inc. IntraNet Solutions agreed to license its Web-based content management products, including its Intra.doc! software products, to IKON as the core architecture for IKON’s Digital Express 2000, a document repository system with hosted document and customized order management capabilities. Digital Express 2000 features print-on-demand and distributed printing options, allowing business users to send print jobs from their desktops via the Web for printing and distribution. In addition, IKON was awarded the exclusive right to sell IntraNet Solutions’ Intra.doc! products to the graphic arts/commercial printing industry, as well as non-exclusive rights to market Xpedio, IntraNet Solutions’ popular Web content management system designed for business-to- business customers, in the United States and Canada. Digital Express 2000 is scheduled for release in January 2001 as an ASP model for the graphic arts market. www.intranetsol.com, www.ikon.com
Interwoven, Inc. and TIBCO Software Inc. announced a strategic alliance to provide comprehensive solutions for business-to-business marketplaces and portals. The recently announced Interwoven Content Interchange Framework will include the TIBCO ActiveEnterprise e-business product suite as a key enterprise integration component, enabling Interwoven customers to manage content from their enterprise applications in real-time. The TIBCO ActiveEnterprise suite will enable joint customers to become real-time e-businesses by seamlessly integrating back-end systems such as ERP, product databases and customer databases, with their Web initiatives. Interwoven and TIBCO also announced that Interwoven’s XML-based TeamSite Templating software will be integrated with the TIBCO ActivePortal product suite, delivering integrated content management and presentation for TIBCO’s portal customers. TeamSite Templating allows easy content entry and tagging including tagging for use across multiple TIBCO ActivePortal-based sites. The TIBCO ActivePortal suite also works seamlessly with TIBCO ActiveEnterprise, enabling enterprises to leverage their integrated application network and B2B commerce infrastructure to provide an integrated, unique set of real-time content and interactive services to their portal audience. www.tibco.com, www.interwoven.com
Liaison announced the availability of Liaison Content Exchange 2.0. Liaison Content Exchange automatically extracts, aggregates and rationalizes data, providing B2B exchanges with the descriptive content necessary to drive purchasing decisions. Liaison Content Exchange software is used by eMarketplaces and large manufacturers. eMarketplaces (trading exchanges) use Content Exchange to automate the process of building and maintaining substantial electronic catalogs consisting of thousands of suppliers and millions of products. Large manufacturers use Content Exchange software to automatically structure product content for e-procurement applications used by their customers, as well as private and third-party eMarketplaces and commerce portals. Liaison Content Exchange automates the gathering of data and is based on Adaptive Content Recognition technology that extracts content from Web pages and other sources, then transforms the content into structured data, greatly reducing the time and expense associated with gathering this type of information. Liaison Content Exchange 2.0 will be available in September directly from Liaison and solution partners. The software is licensed on an annual licensing basis, starting at $140,000. The software requires a Pentium II 450 MHz processor, 256 MB of RAM, 6 MB of free disk space/250 MB for data capture and audit logs, ISDN 128 K, Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 or later, and Windows NT 4.0 SP 4 or later for operation. www.liaison.com
Subscribe to the Gilbane Advisor
