I disagree. If the specs were truly loosely coupled then we would not have discussions concerning discrepancies between the header fields and the CPA. Errors concerning such discrepancies would be implementation dependant. We would not worry about aligning Messaging and CPA. We would not have continual problems with having to remove fields from the Messaging headers because they are already specified in the CPA (in fact, many fields would exist both places). We even voted at the last F2F that there MUST be an agreement in place -- no allowance for spontaneous eCommerce. There has been constant discussion that there MUST be either a CPA or a virtual CPA , which simply means a database containing all the CPA fields and structures even though there may not be an actual XML document anywhere. Quotes from the spec to the contrary are simply my lack of diligence in removing them since the last F2F. If we could move back to a time when we did allow non-agreement (with or without CPA) type eCommerce, then that would remove my objection -- but I don't think that is where we are now. Our original charter was to focus on the SME needs in eCommerce. I would argue the SME's need something more akin to B2C rather than traditional B2B (I don't mean Web based but I do mean spontaneous). My objection is that our (very good) system is largely a rehash of what has gone before (and maybe somewhat of an improvement) but it does NOT adequately address the needs of SME's. Now, someone else please take the SOAP box ;-). Regards, David Fischer Drummond Group.
