RE: [RIF] [UCR]: What is the RIF (revisited) --> changing vendor rule languages

From: Michael Kifer [mailto:kifer@cs.sunysb.edu] 
Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2006 4:57 PM
To: Vincent, Paul D
Cc: public-rif-wg@w3.org
Subject: Re: [RIF] [UCR]: What is the RIF (revisited) --> changing
vendor rule languages 

 

 

"Vincent, Paul D" <PaulVincent@fairisaac.com> wrote:

> 

> There are certainly similarities between the rules market today and
the

> SQL market of the early 80s. This is why the vendors are supporting
the

> OMG PRR and RIF efforts. However, so far there is zero push for

> additional rule construct support in the rule languages. 

 

Perhaps those customers don't know better?

 

Possibly, but more likely their needs are simple enough to be addressed
by the main commercial vendors.

 

But ask companies like Ontoprise, OntologyWorks, XSB Inc., etc., to get
a

different view.

 

Well, these are a different class of rules platform (ontology-based
rules). A perfectly valid class, but one that seems to have a much
smaller market share today.

 

> Possibly a better comparison between PRR(/RIF version of PRR) would be
to

> BPEL. 

 

RIF has little to share technically with BPEL, but a lot with SQL.

 

Yes, technically. But from a market perspective, rule tools are
productivity tools that compare with other software productivity
solutions eg BPM and BPEL. There seems to be some correlation between
the take up of BPM and business rule engines - even if technically they
are disparate.

 

> 

> > Perhaps the reason why the rules

> > market is fairly small is because the current commercial rule
languages 

> > are so pathetically poor and ill-founded.

> 

> If this is the case I have not seen any evidence to support it, and
would

> welcome any links to support this hypothesis!

 

I dunno about the links. But I can tell you about my own limited
experience

consulting for companies. (Consulting is not what I do regularly or

eagerly, hence the disclaimer.) Twice my clients needed a rule language
and

twice we considered various commercial products, including some from

companies represented in RIF. And twice we decided to use something
else,

non-commercial and open source. The commercial offerings just didn't cut
it.

 

I can quite believe it if the need was to reason over an ontology. I
will offer you a beer at the next F2F to discuss further!

 

Now, they didn't run to report to the world that commercial offerings
are

unsuitable --- they just picked something else.

 

No problem with that! 

 

      --michael  

 

> 

> Paul Vincent

> Fair Isaac Blaze Advisor --- Business Rule Management

> OMG Standards for Business Rules, PRR & BPMI

> mobile: +44 (0)781 493 7229 ... office: +44 (0)20 7871 7229 

> 

> 

> -----Original Message-----

> From: Michael Kifer [mailto:kifer@cs.sunysb.edu] 

> Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2006 3:57 PM

> To: Vincent, Paul D

> Cc: Francois Bry; public-rif-wg@w3.org

> Subject: Re: [RIF] [UCR]: What is the RIF (revisited) --> changing
vendor rule languages 

> 

> 

> I remember that SQL people were saying similar things about a bunch of

> features in the 80s. And then they included them in SQL:1999 as a
result of

> customer pressures. For instance, explicit quantifiers and recursion.

> Meanwhile, some vendors, facing customer pressure, added some features

> without waiting for the standard. For instance, Oracle added recursion
way

> back. Unfortunately, the people who designed this extension for Oracle
had

> no foggiest idea about what they were trying to do, and the result was

> nothing short of an abomination.

> 

> RIF should stay away from this approach.  Perhaps the reason why the
rules

> market is fairly small is because the current commercial rule
languages are

> so pathetically poor and ill-founded.

> 

> 

>     --michael  

> 

> 

> "Vincent, Paul D" <PaulVincent@fairisaac.com> wrote:

> > 

> > Most vendor rule languages are still in active development. However,
it

> >  is quite rare to get a rule language change request from a

> >  customer. Certainly I have

> >  never seen any requests to move for example Blaze Advisor SRL in
the

> >  direction of some of the concepts described in the RIF threads.

> > 

> > Of course, a customer needing a particular language feature would
select a rule engine having that feature. The fact that 70-80% of the
commercial rule eng

> in

> > e market is provided by 2 vendors indicates some level of maturity
about their rule languages.

> > 

> > Paul Vincent

> > Fair Isaac Blaze Advisor --- Business Rule Management

> > OMG Standards for Business Rules, PRR & BPMI

> > mobile: +44 (0)781 493 7229 ... office: +44 (0)20 7871 7229 

> > 

> > 

> > -----Original Message-----

> > From: public-rif-wg-request@w3.org
[mailto:public-rif-wg-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Francois Bry

> > Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2006 1:57 PM

> > To: public-rif-wg@w3.org

> > Cc: public-rif-wg@w3.org

> > Subject: Re: [RIF] [UCR]: What is the RIF (revisited)

> > 

> > 

> > Dave Reynolds wrote:

> > 

> > > If we look at the business rules market then we have a number of 

> > > mature and successful products. One goal for RIF in that market is
to 

> > > enable users to move rules between systems, in which case RIF is
for 

> > > interchange between well-established systems. No vendor will
change 

> > > their language to move towards some invented RIF language. 

> > 

> > What about customers? They often make vendors move...

> > -- 

> > 

> > Francois

> > 

> > 

> > 

> > 

> > 

> 

> 

> 

>