Re: ZNG: "Z39.50 Next Generation"

On Mon, 16 Jul 2001, Alan Kent wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 13, 2001 at 05:23:30PM +0100, Robert Sanderson wrote:
> > Get your programmers who are experienced in Z to write an API for your non
> > Z programmers to use. If you chose to publish this API such that others
> > can use it, more power to you. /This/ would be a productive way forward,
> > rather than discarding bits which are complex but have already been
> > implemented by others.
>
> To me, this is exactly what ZNG is - a standardised web services
> interface to Z39.50. Our product is not going to drop the core
> Z39.50 protocol. We are going to add an alternative "web services"
> interface allowing SOAP clients written in any language to access
> our server easily in a way that programmers will understand.

Except that there was no mention of retaining the current Z protocol along
with ZNG.  Either:

a) It's an implementers agreement about which names to use in cgi scripts
which query real Z databases.  or:

b) There's no Z behind it, just an everyday database which could be sql,
moo or anything in between.

Either way, it's useful to people wanting to build a database that can be
queried in a standard way, but is not deserving of the description 'next
generation of Z39.50'.

> I don't see ZNG as a "replacement of Z39.50". I see it as some of
> the vendors agreeing to a subset of Z39.50 via a SOAP based API
> rather than each vendor developing their own proprietory API.

Quite :)  This is useful, especially if the underlying code is released to
the community as well as the specifications of how to use it.

Rob

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Received on Monday, 16 July 2001 04:43:29 UTC