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Hello Paul,
Paul said:
> Either:
>
> 1. the placeholder language is totally and completely standardized
> across all of the services. That means not just that the placeholder
> syntax is standardized but also the variable names and structures are
> standardized. e.g. 500 services, 1 syntax, 1 set of variable names
Didier replies:
The variables do not necessarily need to be standardized, Just look at how
XQL can help you create you own structure from the tables. Fields have
certain names in the database, these fields could be converted into elements
or attribute and be named differently. So, only the query rules need to be
standardized, not the variables. The query rules are used to map the source
entities into element and attributes which are the basic monads[1] or XML.
Paul said:
> 2. the placeholder language is NOT standardized, in which case every
> client has to be specifically coded to talk to every server. e.g. 500
> services, 500 sets of variable names.
Didier replies:
Nothing to say against that. Its obviously true.
Paul said:
> There is some data. There is a template. There is a language that
> combines them. Whether it runs on the client or the server is not
> relevant to the issue of whether there are N*M client and server
> connections or just N. It is totally a question of standardization or
> lack thereof.
Didier replies:
Yes it is, its a question of providing a certain standard helping people to
cope with variety, proliferation of XML based languages and a matter of
economy and cost control.
Paul said:
> I'm not asking Google to support an infinite number of different
> interfaces. I'm asking them to figure out which one is the MOST
> functional and let people dumb down to other ones on the client side.
Didier replies:
The question of functionality resides in the eyes of the client. Different
groups or market segment, different cultural needs. XML is not the most
bandwidth efficient language to transmit information but is the result of a
critical mass of people reaching consensus. Again it is a sociological
issue. What seems important for you may not seems the same way for other
people (anyway you know that). Google may have a lot of difficulties to
satisfy the tastes or the view of the world of everybody. However, they will
respond to group pressure, market segment importance, the sales resulting
from this and ultimately the value created to its shareholders.
Paul said:
> Doing the transformation on the server side buys the customer nothing.
> If Google's templating language calls a quer result "queryResult" and
> AltaVista's calls it "searchResult" and Lycos calls it "result" then I
> need three templates for those three services. I might just as easily
> have done through XSLT transforms on the client side.
Didier said:
Its not necessarily a transformation its simply a way to create the kind of
document on the server without having to wait that the provider develop the
code necessary to do so. We can use the XSLT template mechanism or something
like XQL or a more generalized way to create placeholder/template based
queries. The DB guys either Microsoft or Oracle created something
potentially powerful and there is a possibility to generalize this approcah
to resolve the impedence mismatch between cultures (i.e XML formats).
However, this may not resolve the SOAP issue (or maybe it could but I would
have to give it more thoughts to know).
Paul said:
> Conversely, if the three have all standardized on "queryResult" then
> obviously they are following some published standard somewhere and the
> standard might as well have been an XML schema or DTD rather than a
> "placeholder variable names" standard.
Didier replies:
Yes it may work but we are back to square one, the provider has to develop
the particular format or the client has to learn and adapt to the provider
unique format. A kind of "its my way or the highway". What I am talking
about is a way for the client and the provider to learn a minimal template
based query language and then use it to adapt to each culture (i.e. XML
formats).
cheers
Didier PH Martin
[1] monad: An ultimate atom, or simple, unextended point; something ultimate
and indivisible.
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