(Post 13/10/2005)

It is 2 pm in Sydney and Brad is still in office breaking his head on his application. An application that would help his company to exchange data with its new ally in Czech republic. He has been slogging on it for the past 3 months but no improvement. Brad runs his hand over his hair and thinks What has happened? Why am I stuck? All the past happenings in his company run through his mind as a movie. The start of the application was a gesture of friendship to share data between the companies to strengthen their relationship. It sounded a very good idea and was widely welcomed too. But the underlying problems slowly began to show its ugly face. Brad's company has always been in sync with the current technologies in the market, but the new ally was very much emotionally attached to its legacy system developed a decade before. Brad informed his boss about the problem he was facing in transferring data due to the difference in the business applications and system architecture followed by the two companies. None of the allies were willing to change their settings to have a common platform so that transaction can take place smoothly. Why would they wish to change too? It was not an easy and simple task to change the way things work just in a fortnight, it included the restructuring of the whole business structure again. So now it is upon brad's shoulder to find a solution. Many sleepless nights have all gone in vain no solution has been found. Till now all the leading data exchange tools and techniques have been tried out no use. Can any one help brad with his problem? Is there no technology that would transport data irrespective of the platforms? The answer is Yes, there is a remedy to all the problems of brad and that elixir is XML or eXtensible markup language.

XML, what is this new word? Don't get panicked, it is not a new abbreviation added to the long list of abbreviation that prevail in the IT industry. Nor is it a new language the programmers have to work with to grow crazier. It is a simple but very powerful markup language from the womb of the mighty Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML). It is the younger brother of the Internet ruler HTML. XML looks very similar to HTML in the concept of tags. But unlike HTML, XML completely utilizes the features of SGML and it is flexible too. Introduced as a simple markup language to present as well as hold data XML has now made its impact on each and every facets of the computer industry. It is used in all kinds of domains starting from Client-Server to Web Servers. The visionaries of the mighty business giants IBM, Microsoft and Sun have predicted more growth and utilization of XML and there by large scale experiments are conducted on XML. XML has made its place even in the dream ventures of Microsoft and Sun, the J2EE and .Net frameworks respectively.

The next question that may arise in your mind is: Agreed XML is excellent, marvelous and wonderful to work with but how is it going to solve the problems Brad is facing? Don't worry we are going to answer that next. XML had proven to be the best choice to act as the universal export format. The features that make it the best choice are:

XML has broken all barriers in the way of data exchange between different domains of the business entities and business too.

Thus, Brad can utilize the power of XML to bridge the gap between the domains of the two allies. You may wonder whether it is any kind of black magic or what? No, it is not. When data has to be transferred from brad's company to its partner, the information or data is first converted to XML format. Then with the help of SOAP or any transportation protocol the XML file is transported to its destination that is the allies system. As and when the data is received the information is converted from XML format to the format that is legible to its legacy system. The same steps can be followed for data transportation on the other way round. Isn't it simple?

The flexibility of XML to work with any data format is not only used to exchange data between business applications but it can also be transported between devices. The phone numbers of your suppliers stored in your desktop can be accessed via your mobile phone from any where in the world.

This is not the end for the power of XML. There is more to come. XML and its technologies have changed the way business is carried out in the world. The day is not far when the way the world works may also be changed by XML. So start eXercising and eXperiencing the X factor of eXtensible Markup Language.