Re: [formsPlayer] RE: [svg-developers] Re: SOAP Calls from SVG

Hi Mark,

More and more existing non-XML information is being XMLized into XML, and all XML technologies can be used together for various applications. To fulfill the promise of XML, a complete XML platform is needed to support these technologies so as to gain real business benefits out of them. This includes XML parsing, XML Schema validation, XSLT, XQuery, XML data storage, and indexing. Supporting some XML technologies at the toolkit level, or one XML technology at a time, just isn't good enough. 

The XML technologies I see as important for the 21 century, especially that we can fulfill the promise of business/workflow automation are as follows:-

XQuery
XInclude with XPointer
XForms
XSLT

Kind Regards
Francisco
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Mark Birbeck 
  To: svg-developers@yahoogroups.com 
  Cc: 'Jan-Klaas Kollhof' ; www-forms@w3.org ; w3c-forms@w3.org ; formsPlayer@yahoogroups.com ; HektorK@frogware.com 
  Sent: Monday, August 02, 2004 12:10 AM
  Subject: [formsPlayer] RE: [svg-developers] Re: SOAP Calls from SVG


  Hi Jan-Klaas,

  > nice subject :)

  Indeed!


  > SVG1.2 will bring sockets and better http support.
  > This will allow us to even make SOAP calls (using 100% SVG 
  > without using things like ActiveX or special viewer extensions).

  I have to say that I'm finding myself more and more against this approach.
  It seems that the goal is to cram as much into the SVG language as possible
  to try to make it come close to a 'real' programming environment. But what
  do sockets and protocols have to do with vectors and Gaussian filters? In
  fact, applications that I've seen that are written 'in SVG' are little
  better than applications written 'in HTML'; they both consist of some
  mark-up for the UI, coupled with enormous amounts of script for everything
  else.


  In my view the key to solving some of these problems is better integration
  between standards. Of course that's no easy feat when there are so many
  vested interests, but this topic does illustrate the point well - why not
  leave all the data management, schema validation and so on to XForms, and
  then use SVG for the UI? XForms 1.0 already has strong XML submit and
  receive support, as well as schema validation, and XForms 1.1 will have full
  SOAP support.

  An example of using a weather web service to retrieve some data from a zip
  code (using XForms) and then show the high and low temperature ranges for
  the next five days (using SVG) is available here:

    <http://www.formsplayer.com/demo/web-services/weather-svg.html>


  The demo requires the Adobe plug-in and formsPlayer, an XForms processor for
  IE. If you don't have formsPlayer and want to try this demo out, you can
  download it from:

    http://www.formsPlayer.com/


  Note that the technique used in the example simply involves registering for
  XForms events that allow us to be notified when data has changed, and then
  using script to poke values into the SVG at the right places. In this
  example we set the height and position of the bars to show the temperature
  range, but it could obviously be anything you like; the important difference
  from current techniques is that you can now make use of all the
  model-related features of formsPlayer and XForms:

  * full schema validation with events to tell you when data goes valid or
  invalid
  * ability to submit and receive documents in a variety of serialisations,
  including XML and multipart-MIME
  * create spreadsheet-style dependencies between data, and let the engine
  keep it up-to-date for you

  and much more.


  A more refined approach than the one shown here is where XForms widgets are
  themselves implemented using SVG. We will be making a formsPlayer technology
  preview available any time now, which does exactly that, and in fact one
  demo that will be available is a 'drop-box' that is an SVG map, allowing the
  user to choose an airport.


  But in the meantime, given the current discussion on web services and SVG I
  thought it worth drawing SVG developers' attention to the XForms/SVG/script
  technique illustrated by the weather sample. In the technology preview it
  will be possible to remove the script that wires the XForms and SVG
  processors together, so anyone wishing to work with this current approach
  will be able to take their applications forward.

  If you are not familiar with XForms, and want further examples of using
  XForms to access services, there is a non-SVG version of exactly the same
  weather service here:

    <http://www.formsplayer.com/demo/web-services/weather.html>

  and a sample that accesses Amazon, here:

    <http://www.formsplayer.com/demo/web-services/amazon.htm>

  We also have a very old Google demo here:

    <http://www.formsplayer.com/community/samples/google-search.html>


  So in summary, those using the Adobe plug-in with IE can now use XForms to
  give them the data management side, and then use SVG for the UI.

  Regards,

  Mark


  Mark Birbeck
  CEO
  x-port.net Ltd.

  e: Mark.Birbeck@x-port.net
  t: +44 (0) 20 7689 9232
  w: http://www.formsPlayer.com/

  Download our XForms processor from
  http://www.formsPlayer.com/


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