Mobile, Cloud, JSON, REST, Big Data, NoSQL, Social Media (MCJRBNS) Working Group meets this week

We are scheduled to have our MCJSBNS Working Group meeting this coming Thursday, July 26, 2012.  The Working Group has members from Cisco, Oracle, GXS, Infor, iBASEt, Command Alkon, and AgGateway. 

We are getting good input particularly from members who are already using JSON and REST in their organizations.  We are finding that it is early days with the technologies outside of pure Cloud and Mobile applications and so this is both a Working Group and a research group at the same time so it is a tremendous learning experience.

We are also working on a White Paper which we plan to release the Wednesday after the US Labor Day holiday. 

The team meetings every other Thursday at 4 PM EDT.  If you are interested in joining the Working Group please write to me at inquiry@oagi.org.

Leveraging Standards to Drive Down Costs

I am often asked by IT persons why they should bother with standards.  Particularly Project Team people who see them as an unnecessary overhead to their project.  Architects often see them as a hindrance to their creativity.  They can always invent something better.

We have a presentation on our website on the top left that addresses the benefits of implementing OAGIS.  But I thought about bringing this to a global scale and so I did done some research on how standards save money and have found some good work out of the German Institute for Standardization.

It is entitled   "Economic benefits of standardization, Summary of results." and here are some the results:

Standards save money

The results of the survey reflect this. The businesses surveyed rate the effects of standardization on transaction costs as positive (mean value of +21.8 on a scale of –50 = very negative to +50 = very positive), indicating that transaction costs drop considerably as a result of standards, for they make information available and are accessible to all interested parties. They are therefore a factor in reducing transaction costs.

Standards improve sales efficiency

Improved sales efficiency due to decreased trading costs, simplification of contractual agreements, and lowering of trade barriers.

Standards reduce risk

The standards development process, through prototyping, and agreements by its proponents, insure standards are implementable and incorporate best practices.

Standards provide investment protection

When it comes time to retire a standards-based product, it is likely that replacements will be available (from a variety of vendors) supporting the standards.

Standards improve economies of scale

Employing standards in software components, increases the reusability of modules. Reuse increases sales and therefore the production of these components, making them cheaper to build. This further increases their usability and the competitiveness of products that use them.

Standards extend product life

Product life extension. Products that use standards are less likely to require replacement in order to integrate with other, newer products.

Standards protect against Obsolescence

Standards organizations are generally highly motivated to provide an orderly way to migrate to new versions of standards.

Standards reduce Development Time and Costs

Finding trained and experienced personnel for standardized technologies is easier than for proprietary technologies.

Summary

In summary, standards can open doors.  For example, Without the agreement to use TCP/IP, the Internet would not exist.  This did not constrain innovation, it fostered innovation.

REMINDER: Public Review of Chem eStandards Release 5.2 ends Thursday, July 19

This is a reminder that the Public Review of Chem eStandards Release 5.2 ends Thursday, July 19. We encourage you to go take a look and give us your feedback.

The public review package is available at:

http://www.oagi.org/dnn2/DownloadsandResources/ChemeStandards52PublicReview.aspx

OAGi welcomes your feedback and questions at inquiry@oagi.org.

Here is a summary of changes and additions:

• Added the following code list values to cidxListPriceType: FOBOriginPrice and FOBDestinationPrice
• Added the following code list value to cidxListReferenceType: TransferNumber
• Added the following code list value to cidxListPartnerRoles: Reporter
• Changed ProductInformation/PackagingInformation maximum occurrence from one to unbounded
• Added IndustrySegment element as a child element of PriceSheetProperties and PriceSheetLineItem. The occurrence is optional and unbounded. The allowable values are AgChem, Chem, Energy, Feed, Fertilizer, Grain, Paper, and Seed.
• Added integer element SeedCountPerPound as a child of ProductSubLineItem. The occurrence is optional and unbounded.
• Added element LotQuantity to ProductSubLineItem. It is optional and may occur up to one time.

Thanks for your continued support 

OAGi News for July 2012

For regular updates of activities and happenings, you can follow us on Facebook here.  You can also find us on LinkedIn here, and Twitter here.  We ask our members and friends to “like” and follow us.

Remember, if you are not yet a member of OAGi you can review the all of the benefits of OAGi membership here.

OAGIS Release 9.6 is Now Available!

We are pleased to announce that OAGIS Release 9.6 is available.

This release of OAGIS brings a great deal of new content as well as some technical advancements that bring us closer to OAGIS Release 10 (OAGIS X).  The architecture Council is calling this release a bridge release.

Several changes have been made to support the new UN/CEFACT 3.0 Naming and Design Rules and Core Component Technical Specification (CCTS) 3.0.  Other changes were made to better enable our OAGIS users to take advantage of the UN/CEFACT Context Mechanism Specification (UCM).

In addition, the content that is added in this release of OAGIS includes:

·         Configuration Noun

·         Updates to Quote Noun

·         Party Screen Noun

·         Party Screen Response Noun

·         Warehouse Order (EDI X12 940)

·         Warehouse Shipping Advice (EDI X12 945)

·         Item Non Conformance Noun and Scenario

·         Architecture enhancements to the Extensions Mechanism and Process

·         Change requests submitted by members and users

You can download OAGIS Release 9.6 for free here.

Website Registrations nears 6,000!

The OAGi website registrations continue to climb, with a total of 5,940 registrations at the time of this writing.  That represents 95 countries at last count.  The breakdown is just below.  Thank you for your continued support for this fantastic following.

 Chem eStandards Release 5.2 Public Review Continues

The Public Review of Chem eStandards (i.e., Ag eStandards ) Release 5.2 public review period continues through 19 July 2012.  The changes to the standard were requested by several companies within AgGateway, who is a member of the OAGi Chemical Industry Council and a partner of OAGi.

The public review period will continue through 19 July 2012. AgGateway and OAGi welcome questions and comments at inquiry@oagi.org.  We encourage you to participate in the public review.  You can download it here:

http://www.oagi.org/dnn2/DownloadsandResources/ChemeStandards52PublicReview.aspx

Mobile, Cloud, JSON Initiative continues to make progress

Our Mobile, Cloud, and JSON Working Group continues to meet and make progress.  The most recent work has focused on using OAGIS within a REST framework, the most popular way to code API’s in the cloud and for mobile.

We are looking at using the 4 regular verbs for REST processing: GET, PUT, DELETE, and POST.  We are thinking we may need to augment them with some of the existing OAGIS Verbs also, but that decision has not been made.

We have also declared that the highest form of content will be the OAGIS Noun and the lowest could be even at the Element level.  The componentization of the OAGIS architecture really lays a strong foundation for this new use of OAGIS.

None of this means we will be eliminating the BOD Messaging capability, we are augmenting it with the REST capability.

Remember it is the content that is important and the more ways we can use the content the more useful the common data model will be of users of OAGIS.

OAGi survey "How are you using OAGIS?" continues with excellent response

OAGi has recently launched a new OAGIS survey entitled "How are you using OAGIS?".  The purpose of this survey is to find out more information about who is using OAGIS and how they are using it.

We have added the survey to our OAGIS download page as well as the front page of our web site.  We invite you to participate in the survey.  You can go directly to the survey here.

OAGIS Release 10 work continues with four ongoing initiatives

The OAGIS Release Ten (OAGIS X) Working Groups continue to meet on a regular basis and we encourage your participation.  We can use all the smart people we can get!  The meetings include Architecture, HR Content, Chemical Industry Gap Analysis, and Context.

All OAGi members are invited to join any of these groups.  If you are interested in joining any of these Working Groups, please contact us here.

Meeting Calendar for 2012

OAGi has recently moved revised and republished it’s events calendar.  This calendar contains all Working Group, Council Meetings, and face to face meetings. 

We welcome all OAGi members and users to take advantage of this revised calendar.  You can access our calendar here.

Policy Board Meeting – Completed	April 24, 2012	NIST	Gaithersburg, Maryland
Plenary and Working Groups - Completed	April 25 - 26, 2012	NIST	Presentations are available here.

Policy Board Meeting Planned	November 13, 2012	Oracle	Redwood Shores, CA, USA
Plenary and Working Groups Completed	November 14 - 15, 2012	Oracle	Redwood Shores, CA, USA.

European Meeting

We are working determining these dates and will announce them as soon as possible.

TBD

TBD