The Graphic Communications Association announced the creation of the not-for-profit International Digital Enterprise Alliance (IDEAlliance). IDEAlliance will provide comprehensive support to working groups engaged in developing industry- specific applications of both vertical and cross-industry open information standards. Current member groups of the IDEAlliance include: the Information and Content Exchange (ICE), which establishes standards for the syndication and aggregation of information across industries; the Publishing Requirements for Industry Standard Metadata (PRISM), which is developing a standard XML metadata vocabulary for the publishing industry; the Customer Profile Exchange Network, a vendor-neutral open standard for the privacy-enabled exchange of customer profile information across disparate systems and applications; and the Independent Consultants Cooperative (ICC), an organization of XML/SGML consultants. Like its predecessor, the Graphic Communications Association Research Institute, IDEAlliance will serve as a host for meetings of the committees and other working groups of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), OASIS, ANSI, and W3C – groups responsible for the development and maintenance of structured information standards, XML, SGML, and their derivatives. www.IDEAlliance.org
Category: Semantic technologies (Page 69 of 72)
Our coverage of semantic technologies goes back to the early 90s when search engines focused on searching structured data in databases were looking to provide support for searching unstructured or semi-structured data. This early Gilbane Report, Document Query Languages – Why is it so Hard to Ask a Simple Question?, analyses the challenge back then.
Semantic technology is a broad topic that includes all natural language processing, as well as the semantic web, linked data processing, and knowledge graphs.
SAQQARA Systems, Inc. announced the SAQQARA Commerce Suite that enables a “Content for Commerce” solution featuring product information management, publishing and XML exchange applications. Extending SAQQARA’s catalog management software, the new SAQQARA Commerce Suite represents a offering that combines search and guided buying functionality for industrial manufacturers and suppliers to easily establish an e-business strategy and capitalize on the tremendous e-commerce sales opportunities. By deploying the new SAQQARA Commerce Suite, businesses have a front-end application to launch customized commerce strategies that include integration with existing enterprise systems and interoperability with supply chain partners. Specifically, the suite provides Global 2000 manufacturers with a set of complementary Web server applications that enable them to manage and publish detailed product information with advanced product selection capabilities, exchange product information with supply chain partners via emerging XML standards, analyze customers’ online selection processes and fully participate in business-to-business electronic commerce opportunities. The SAQQARA Commerce Suite is an evolution of the company’s Step Search catalog management software. The new SAQQARA Commerce Suite leverages that technology into a complete suite of applications that enables product information management for e-commerce. ProductServer and the ProductServer Author will be available January 2000 and together are priced starting at $60,000. For those companies seeking an outsourced services model, pricing for application hosting starts at $3,000 per month. SolutionServer and the SolutionServer Author will be available January 2000 as an outsourced services model. Pricing for application hosting starts at $5,000 per month. PIXServer is scheduled for release in April 2000. AnalysisServer will be available January 2000 and is priced starting at $7,500. www.saqqara.com
Hummingbird Communications Ltd. unveiled its metadata strategy and announced Genio MetaExplorer. A fully customizable, Web-based solution, MetaExplorer is designed to support the information search and analytical needs of information consumers by providing access to all decision support metadata repositories within an organization. At the heart of MetaExplorer is MetaData Server, an intelligent middle-tier solution with a driver-based, plug-and-play architecture. MetaData Server enables dynamic access to the rich variety of decision support metadata stored within the enterprise. Hummingbird will provide drivers to access the leading industry metadata repositories in addition to providing APIs to build drivers for accessing other metadata repositories. Complementing MetaExplorer and MetaData Server, is the new Hummingbird Enterprise Repository (HERO) that leverages XML-enabled metadata access and interchange. With HERO, organizations can now move to a common repository of metadata that provides the architectural glue that binds together the various components of the enterprise intelligence environment. HERO will simplify deployment, improve scalability to an enterprise scale, reduce integration challenges, and ease the maintenance burden to reduce the total cost of ownership. Genio MetaExplorer is expected to be available in Q1 2000. www.hummingbird.com
Hummingbird Communications launched the Fulcrum Portal Builder Kit, a toolset that provides enterprises with the ability to construct compelling knowledge portals. The Fulcrum Portal Builder Kit is a complete solution designed so that it can also easily plug into Hummingbird’s Enterprise Information Portal (EIP), scheduled for beta release next month. Priced as one bundle, the Fulcrum Portal Builder Kit consists of DOCSFulcrum 3.0, Hummingbird’s Web-accessible enterprise knowledge management offering; Fulcrum SearchServer 4.0, the latest version of the company’s information retrieval software; and the new Knowledge Manager Workstation 1.0 (KMW), which uses neural network technology to automatically create a business taxonomy. KMW adds the power of document mining to the DOCSFulcrum product family, making it easier to offer users a portal into the unstructured information stored in corporate repositories. The Fulcrum Portal Builder Kit will be released on November 26, 1999. www.hummingbird.com
Eloquent, Inc., and Gilat Communications Ltd. announced a partnership to offer a joint business communications and distance learning solution. This solution leverages Gilat’s live broadcast and interactive capabilities and Eloquent’s on-demand rich media capabilities to provide a complete “live to on-demand” business communications and interactive learning platform. Gilat’s TrainNet is an IDL system which enables a live, interactive instructor-led classroom experience by providing full-screen, full-motion video broadcast to classrooms and individual PCs over broadband, LAN or Internet connections. TrainNet also features instantaneous application projection, collaboration tools and feedback buttons that enhance the communication and interaction between teacher and student. The TrainNet platform is a robust and fully scalable solution for both corporate as well as educational institutions. Eloquent’s rich media format-synchronized video, audio, text and graphics-will capture, organize, and archive live TrainNet sessions. Customers can now make TrainNet content available on demand over the Web at typical Internet bandwidths, extending the value of the original broadcast to students, employees, and partners who are not able to attend the live sessions. In addition, personalized, pre-event presentations from Eloquent enable participants with different backgrounds to prepare appropriately for TrainNet sessions. Eloquent’s rich media format and the Eloquent Enterprise Communications Portal Server also enable customers to create a fully searchable and navigable archive of TrainNet materials, extending their useful life and enhancing their value to the organization. www.eloquent.com
WholeWeb.net announced a technology licensing, integration, and distribution agreement with Excalibur Technologies Corporation. Under the agreement, WholeWeb.net obtains the rights to integrate Excalibur RetrievalWare, and the Excalibur Multimedia Spider into its next generation search application. WholeWeb.net brings a very large database (VLDB) technology to the Web to improve coverage, relevancy, and end user expectations at a reduced cost. Excalibur RetrievalWare, an intranet search system typically used in large knowledge-focused enterprise implementations, emphasizes accuracy and scalability and excels in managing multiple data types in geographically-dispersed environments. The combination of the two technologies enables WholeWeb.net to search five billion records per second. By viewing the Web as a large, unstructured information problem, and by applying extremely fast and powerful relational database technology, WholeWeb.net covers the whole Web now, maintains its breadth of coverage as the Web grows, and places powerful interactive, graphical information mining tools in the hands of end users. This underlying core technology has been used commercially for over 10 years in mission-critical applications such as telephone billing and credit card processing. www.wholeweb.net
Sequoia Software Corporation and Wavo Corporation announced that Sequoia has become one of the first to join Wavo’s Business Partner program. Sequoia will immediately make Wavo’s NewsPak, an XML-formatted real-time news feed available to customers deploying Interactive Enterprise Portals based on its XML Portal Server. NewsPak is the industry’s leading solution for delivering real-time content to Web servers worldwide. With NewsPak any Sequoia XML Portal Server user can access error-free, real-time content streams from a catalog of over 400 media sources including CNBC, Ziff-Davis, USA Today, Comtex, Knight Ridder and UPI. The NewsPak feeds are automatically tagged in industry-standard XML formats, which allows them to be searched, customized and managed by the Sequoia XML Portal Server as though they were any other XML data source. Sequoia XML Portal Server uses XML to bridge structured and unstructured data from disparate sources, and provides a personalized Web interface from which users can quickly and easily search for, retrieve and act on information. Sequoia XML Portal Server allows users to conduct accurate context-sensitive searches. Additionally, Sequoia XML Portal Server further shortcuts information retrieval by providing users with customized content summaries called Aggregate XML Objects (AXOs). AXOs are assembled by aggregating multiple, unique XML data elements into a new object that represents a user’s specific information requirements. www.wavo.com, www.sequoiasoftware.com
Bentley Systems, Incorporated announced that its Web-based ModelServer Integrator product includes support for XML and aecXML. ModelServer Integrator is an information broker for engineering projects that enables engineering enterprises to assemble information from multiple databases and software applications and present relevant, timely, and accurate information to users throughout the organization. ModelServer Integrator’s support of XML allows users to take full advantage of the wealth of rapidly emerging support tools, technology, and standards built around XML in such areas as e-commerce and data exchange. Important among these is the industry-wide aecXML effort which Bentley initiated earlier this year (www.aecxml.org). In this initiative, the aecXML Working Group is a forum for industry, government, research communities and end users to contribute to an XML schema particularly suited for architecture, engineering and construction (A/E/C). ModelServer Integrator, with support for XML, will be available in the fourth quarter of 1999.
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