[XML-SIG] XML Schema and e-commerce

[Laurent Szyster]

XML Schema is a "standard" candidate pushed forward by Microsoft
for it's BizTalk e-commerce initiative. Basically, MS proposes to
build a web of e-commerce document specifications.

XML with Schema could be a substitute for traditional EDI (EDIFACT,
X12, etc). This means savings for SME, as Microsoft provides
the document browser, validating parser and an XSLT mapper for free.

However, I don't think e-commerce will be built on XML Schema. 

The reason is that XML Schema is conceptually the same thing as
EDIFACT or X12. It's the same methodology: you define a standard
interface and you add support for it into your application.
Unfortunately the process of standard definition takes a long
time and the result is a huge and complex data model that tries
to fit all existing applications (well, the applications of the
companies who paid enough money to get their requirement into the
standard ;-)

So, developping e-commerce interfaces with XML Schemas and XSLT
stylesheets will not be significantly faster or less expensive
than doing it with traditional EDI tools.


Laurent Szyster
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