Next Generation HTML: Netscape and Microsoft
June 7th 1998
In the diagram, we have indicated specific associations with
Netscape and Microsoft, but these groupings require some
explanation since the connections are not as clear as the picture
seems to indicate.
CDF
(with authors from Microsoft and Marimba),
OFX
Microsoft, Intuit, and CheckFree),
OSD
Open Software Description from Microsoft and Marimba),
XML-Data
(Microsoft, ArborText, University of Edinburgh, DataChannel, and
Inso Corp.), and
Namespaces in XML
(Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, and Textuality) all include
Microsoft authors.
In brief, CDF (a W3C Note) is push technology, OSD provides
platform independent installation and updates, and OFX supports
bill payments and investments in stocks, bonds, and mutual funds.
(Neither OSD or OFX are under the influence of the W3C.)
XML-Data
is a W3C Note aimed at making XML database-ready, especially for
three-tier architectures and heterogeneous databases by adding a
syntax for schemas and a model for extending XML elements (with
data types, inheritance, validation and presentation rules).
Namespaces in XML is a Working Draft.
XML namespaces
"provide a simple method for qualifying [element] names
used in Extensible Markup Language documents by associating them
with namespaces identified by URI."
Netscape is involved in different areas of XML work, primarily in
the W3C Metadata Activity
area.
MCF (Meta Content
Framework Using XML) (Netscape and Textuality) is a W3C Note
based in part on earlier work by Apple called HotSauce. MCF, a
data model for describing metadata (information about data, such
as web resources) which will be used, among other things, to provide
a 3-D like view of a web site's hierarchy. Other metadata efforts
are
RDF (Resource
Description Framework) Schemas
(with authors from Netscape, Microsoft, and University of Bristol)
and the related
RDF Model and Syntax
(Nokia Research Center and the W3C) Working Drafts. The
goal of RDF is "to produce a language for the exchange of
machine-understandable descriptions of resources on the Web".
Since in reality all but OFX and OSD are W3C efforts, both
companies have input to all of the proposals mentioned in this
section as active members of the Consortium. Netscape and
Microsoft's involvement in W3C specifications will be the subject
of a future article of the
WDVL.
Next Generation HTML: XML Applications (Vocabularies)
Next Generation HTML: The Big Picture
Next Generation HTML: Acronym Expander
|
