RE: Web payments messaging and APIs

Kris wrote:
> These calls / scenarios have no relationship with ISO 20022. Why is 
> that?

Manu wrote:
>Trying ISO20022 to the Web Payments API is most likely the wrong level of abstraction. 
>Carrying ISO20022 messages is most likely best done by ensuring that the messages that 
>the Web Payments API routes are capable of expressing ISO20022 message classes like 
>PAIN and the like.

Early in the life of the IG, we knew we did not want to unnecessarily reinvent[1] the wheel with regard to message content.  

Using the semantics (not syntax) of ISO20022 is one way we might help fulfill that goal.  I'm worried that the messages presented are not easily understood as trying to reuse the semantics.  Is it indeed the messages, and not the API, that don't seem aligned?

Best regards,
David

[1] operative here is "unnecessarily".  Reinventing may indeed be in the offing, depending on decisions by the groups.  IMO any such reinventing should be informed.

-----Original Message-----
From: Manu Sporny [mailto:msporny@digitalbazaar.com] 
Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2015 10:02 AM
To: KETELS Kris; Web Payments IG
Subject: Re: Web payments messaging and APIs

On 10/01/2015 02:13 AM, KETELS Kris wrote:
> My upfront apologies if my reading these documents have led to the 
> wrong conclusions if there are other documents posted somewhere that 
> contain the answers to my question.

Just a brief disclaimer before I attempt to answer your questions:

The documents that were linked to are being worked on in the "Web Payments Community Group" (which is different than this group and the upcoming Web Payments Working Group). The work the Web Payments Community Group does is experimental and is not on the standards track.

*It is not predictive of what the Web Payments Working Group will do.*

It is merely meant as input into the discussion. The ideas are half-baked and are in a constant state of flux.

Unfortunately, much of this stuff is either tribal knowledge and/or documented (badly and out of date) here:

https://web-payments.org/specs/


> The payments API 1.0 document contains the scenarios/transactions to  
> govern web payments.
> 
> These calls / scenarios have no relationship with ISO 20022. Why is 
> that?

The Web Payments API document is an attempt to create a payment scheme agnostic mechanism to route payment initiation requests and payment initiation responses via the Web. The relationship to ISO20022, card networks, ACH, Bitcoin, Ven, Ripple, Ethereum, etc. are exposed in the messages themselves, not the API.

Another way to put it is that the HTTP protocol (which moves documents around the Web) is agnostic to the content that is shipped. It places that content in the box and routes it to where it needs to go. In the same way, we're trying to propose a mechanism that enables the Web Payments work to express payment messages and route them via the various proposed APIs in a payment scheme agnostic manner.

Trying ISO20022 to the Web Payments API is most likely the wrong level of abstraction. Carrying ISO20022 messages is most likely best done by ensuring that the messages that the Web Payments API routes are capable of expressing ISO20022 message classes like PAIN and the like.

Again, this is just one proposal that's on the table. Google's Chrome team has put another one forward, and the job of the Web Payments Working Group is to sort this sort of stuff out.

Does that answer your question?

-- manu

--
Manu Sporny (skype: msporny, twitter: manusporny, G+: +Manu Sporny) Founder/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
blog: Web Payments: The Architect, the Sage, and the Moral Voice https://manu.sporny.org/2015/payments-collaboration/

Received on Thursday, 1 October 2015 17:01:44 UTC