Re: Our future course (Was: Re: WS-I)

At 11:10 AM 3/14/02, Jacek Kopecky wrote:
>  Hi all,
>  let me try to pick the situation apart:
>
>  WS-I is here to provide best practices for WSDL and some
>profiles limiting WSDL. All for interoperability. All for WSDL
>1.1.

Just to clarify a bit. The first (Basic) Profile that WS-I is setting out 
to define encompasses more than just WSDL. It's XMLP (SOAP) + WSDL + Schema 
+ UDDI. Basically everything one needs for end-to-end interop at a very 
basic level--What can developers and clients count on being there. How does one
use those specs. SOAP and WSDL are designed to support some very nice 
extensibility frameworks; and that is one of the strengths of the 
technology. But that is also the enemy of interoperability. So even if 
there were no ambiguity in any of the specs, there would still be a need to 
nail down exactly what schema is to be used, what encoding to use, what 
bindings, where exactly does a client look to discover an interface 
definition, etc., etc.

A rock solid, bug free, completely unambiguous spec for WSDL 1.x is not 
going to solve the end to end interop problem. And as we move up the food 
chain to include e.g. transactions, security, conversations, etc. there 
needs to be a way to knit all the pieces together.

cheers,
   jeff



>  We are here to take WSDL 1.1 and come up with a better version
>of the same. From my reading of the charter (I read it again
>right now) it is unclear whether we're to produce a patched spec
>or a new one, inspired by (and possibly similar to) WSDL 1.1.
>
>  If the working group was created half a year earlier, I think
>WS-I would not be created. Our position would then clearly be to
>provide a nice and crisp and polished WSDL 1.1 as WSDL 1.2 (the
>patched version).
>
>  But now since we do have WS-I to take care of the usability of
>WSDL 1.1, I think it is more feasible to start from scratch, with
>(possibly heavy) inspiration taken from WSDL 1.1.
>
>  In my experience patched specs read much worse and also contain
>lots of space for inconsistencies. Patching SOAP 1.1 was what we
>decided to do in XMLP WG and we're still stumbling upon new
>issues where there are different meaning of the text possible
>(and present in the group).
>
>  This stumbling and the need to identify all the issues in the
>original spec (as opposed to the issues in the original design)
>make the work take very long.
>
>  Now my guess is that if we start from scratch, only borrowing
>from WSDL where appropriate, it won't take much longer (or even
>that long) and we'll end up with a simpler and nicer spec ready
>to be named WSDL 2.0. But the actual version number may be 1.2 to
>ease the perceived impact, this won't really matter then. 8-)
>
>  Now is the time to do it right. 8-)
>
>  Best regards,
>
>                    Jacek Kopecky
>
>                    Senior Architect, Systinet (formerly Idoox)
>                    http://www.systinet.com/
>
>
>
>On Thu, 14 Mar 2002, Stumbo, William K wrote:
>
>  > I didn't detect any clear direction on WS-I coming out of today's 
> telephone
>  > conference.  It seems we've currently tied any working relationship to the
>  > definition of our scope.
>  >
>  > >From the comments made by those involved with WS-I (Arthur?), it 
> seems to me
>  > that we can probably craft some sort of working relationship that benefits
>  > both parties.  Whether we need to formalize a relationship, I can't say.
>  >
>  > I'd like to suggest, as a way of making progress, that the WS-I 
> members put
>  > a proposal for a relationship on the table.  We  can debate the merits of
>  > working together until we're blue in the face.  Lets focus the discussion
>  > around a specific proposal and see where that goes.
>  >
>  > What information could the WG expect from WS-I?  How should we expect 
> to use
>  > it?  What can we provide WS-I that would help their mission?
>  >
>  > Bill Stumbo
>  > Xerox Research & Technology
>  > Solutions & Services Technology Center
>  >
>  > wstumbo@crt.xerox.com
>  >     Phone:   585.422.0616
>  >     Fax:     585.265.8424
>  >

--
Jeff Mischkinsky                    jeff.mischkinsky@oracle.com
Consulting Member Technical Staff   +1(650)506-1975 (voice)
Oracle Corporation                  +1(650)506-7225 (fax)
400 Oracle Parkway, M/S 4OP960
Redwood Shores, CA 94065 USA

Received on Thursday, 14 March 2002 22:23:38 UTC