RE: Trolling a little deeper with XML

[HALL Bill <bill -dot- hall -at- tenix -dot- com>]

Guy McDonald asked,

"I'd like to hear from people who use XML in an application development
environment. Or if you use it for work process enhancement or any other
interesting scenario."

Check out my Technical Communication article in the May 2001 issue. An
electronic copy is posted to http://www.tenix.com/PDFLibrary/91.pdf. The
specific implementation was SGML on a native XML database
(http://www.simdb.com), but could have just as easily be implemented in XML
except for the fact that all of our Australian Defence standards are still
based on SGML. This project has been mentioned several times on Techwr-l, so
I won't bore people by repeating its details here.

However, following on from our successful use of content management
technology here, Tenix has joined a consortium comprised of CSIRO
Manufacturing Science and Technology Manufacturing Systems and Automation
group (http://www.msa.cmst.csiro.au); RMIT University Multimedia Database
Systems (http://www.mds.rmit.edu.au - developers of the SIM product)
SpeedLegal (http://www.speedlegal.com - developers of the SmartPrecedent
product) and the Australian Industry Defence Network
(http://www.aidn.org.au/ - the industry association representing defence
suppliers). We are working to develop and demonstrate a draft standard in
XML for modelling the content of defence major product contracts.
Substantial detail on the project has been published to the Web and can be
found via Google:
http://www.google.com/search?num=50&hl=en&q=tenix+rmit+sim+contracts&btnG=Go
ogle+Search. The intent is to develop the DTD(s) as open source and publish
results of the demonstration project via the LegalXML Organisation
(http://www.legalxml.org/).

The consortium has an outstanding application for grant funds from
Australia's National Office of the Information Economy to do the work. We
know we have been short-listed and should learn within a couple of weeks
whether the project has been funded or not. Failing support here, we will
seek support via other avenues.

Using a requirements based statement of the contract terms, conditions,
specifications and scope of work in XML, we should be able to substantially
reduce the effort required to construct RFTs, to bid against them, to
negotiate the details of the contract, and to flow down prime contract
details to many subcontractors and suppliers. It should also be possible to
build a complete knowledge management framework around the elements defined
in the XML contract.

I hope this helps. Anyone with specific questions relating to either project
is welcome to contact me for more information.

Bill Hall
Documentation Systems Analyst
Strategy and Development Group
Tenix Defence
Level 10, Yarra Tower
World Trade Centre
Flinders Street
Melbourne Victoria 3005
Australia
Tel: +61 3 8662 7939
     +61 3 8662 7600 (switchboard)
URL: http://www.tenix.com
Mailto:bill -dot- hall -at- tenix -dot- com

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