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alphaWorks 's goal is to speed emerging technologies from IBM's research and development laboratories to the early adopter developer community before opportunities for commercialization have been explored, thereby allowing the developer community to provide feedback and to influence the direction and development of technology within IBM. All alphaWorks technologies are offered as a free 90-day trial download.
alphaWorks offers more than 220 emerging technologies through categories such as Autonomic Computing, Java technology, Web Services, Wireless, Security, Collaboration, Application Development, Systems Management, and of course, XML. These categories can be selected from the left-hand navigation panel that is persistent throughout the site. The search function located on the top right panel of the masthead provides an easy way to locate technologies by keywords. In addition, new technologies are located in the center panel of the site as they are published, allowing a quick glimpse of what’s new in emerging categories as well as technologies that have recently been updated.
Figure 1. alphaWorks main page
Getting started with XML technology
Technologies are broken down within the categories based on what they do. Once you've selected XML (see Figure 2), you can drill down further to select a technology within the following sub-categories:
These are also cross-referenced, when relevant, to help you find things through multiple avenues. For example, you might find a technology listed in Web services as well as XML. You can find the breakdown of sub-categories at the top right of any technology area as shown in Figure 2. In addition, like the home page, every technology area includes a list of new and updated technologies.
Figure 2. alphaWorks XML technology page
alphaWorks XML technology, like the other areas of the site, strives to reflect the latest industry developments, standards, and specifications. Frequently, technology launched on the alphaWorks Web site coincides with the announcement of an industry standard or specification. IBM works closely with industry groups such as XML.org to ensure that the technologies are in fact emerging -- and reflect what the emerging technology community is interested in. The technology creators, who work for IBM research and development labs worldwide, strive to address business and technical problems with their technology solutions.
Once you've selected a technology to view, you are directed to the appropriate technology overview page (see Figure 3). Here you will find all the essentials of that technology, starting with descriptions of what it is and how it works. The right-hand navigation panel offers additional information that can prove valuable in determining if you want to download the technology, including:
- Systems requirements for download and installation
- Frequently asked questions
- Information about the creators of the technology
- Complete technology evaluation surveys and other user evaluations
- Articles written about the technology
In addition, you'll also find user forums moderated by the technology creators themselves. This allows you to network with other users of the technology, and provide and receive feedback from the creators as well. Frequently, demos are also available to offer a glimpse into how the technology works and the benefits of using it.
Figure 3. Technology overview page
All of the technology overview pages also offer resources related to the technology (see Figure 4). Located under the navigation on the right side are Development Resources -- other Web sites dedicated to development and support, white papers, articles, tutorials, and training. You'll also find related technologies and demos, as well as top downloads, alphaWorks highlights, and related technologies.
Figure 4. Related resources
Once you've decided to download a technology, various download options are presented on the page with the most prominent one on the top right corner (see Figure 3). Click the download button, and you are presented with some quick decisions about your systems and what is required to install the technology. Once you've made the selection and clicked Download Now, you are presented with a standard license for the 90-day trial download. Once you've accepted the standard terms of the license, downloading and installing alphaWorks technologies are quick and painless.
Use the emerging alpha code to explore, learn, innovate, and integrate. Interact with other users and technology creators, and provide your feedback -- find out more at http://www.ibm.com/alphaworks/xml!
Overview of XML emerging technologies
Web Services for DB2 Intelligent Miner (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/ws4im)
Web Services for DB2 Intelligent MinerTM is a collection of Web services that allow clients to describe and perform basic data-mining tasks using XML, XML Schema, and XPath on top of DB2 Intelligent Miner. It provides simple access to the main functions of DB2 Intelligent Miner Modeling and Scoring without requiring a single line of SQL to be written. In data-mining terms, modeling is the step of developing analytical models based on a set of input data. Scoring allows one to apply these models on large databases or single records to predict values. The Web services allow a client to execute these operations as tasks defined in XML. Modeling and scoring can thereby be executed as synchronous or asynchronous calls. Furthermore, the services interchange models by using the Predictive Model Mark-up Language (PMML), which is an open standard for describing data-mining models in XML.
XML Data Mediator (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/XI)
XML Data Mediator (formerly XML Integrator) is a tool for bi-directional data conversion between XML and structured data formats such as relational or LDAP data. This tool externalizes the specification of the mapping between XML and relational databases, and it replaces the programming effort by the simpler effort of writing a script that describes the relationships between the XML constructs and the corresponding RDBMS constructs. XML Data Mediator can be used as a standalone utility, or it can be integrated as a library in other applications.
XML Wrapper Generator (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/wrappergenerator)
The XML Wrapper Generator is a graphical tool that enables rapid and automatic integration of XML data sources into a DB2 database using the XML Wrapper. This tool loads XML schema files, "shreds" them to a relational schema, and generates appropriate NICKNAME and VIEW statements. (Shredding refers to taking apart an XML document or schema and placing the pieces in a set of tables.)
Xeena (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xeena)
Xeena, a visual XML editor, is a generic Java application for editing valid XML documents derived from any valid DTD. XML files can be created and edited without learning the intricacies of XML. The editor takes as input a given DTD and automatically builds a palette containing the elements defined in the DTD. Any document derived from that DTD by using a visual, tree-directed paradigm can thus be created, edited, or expanded. The visual paradigm requires only a minimal learning curve, because only valid constructs or elements are presented to the user in a context-sensitive palette.
XSL Formatting Objects Composer (XFC) (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xfc)
XSL Formatting Objects Composer (XFC) is a typesetting and display engine that implements a substantial portion of XSL Formatting Objects (FO), which became a W3C Recommendation on October 15, 2001. XSL-FO is an XML language for typesetting, printing, or displaying any of the world's written languages. XFC produces either an interactive onscreen display using Java2D or an output file using PDF. A single formatting engine drives both Java2D and PDF output through a common interface, making XFC the world's first output-independent processor of XSL-FO. Other outputs are possible, and some are being developed.
IBM XML Forms Package (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xmlforms)
The IBM XML Forms Package is a toolkit consisting of software components designed to showcase the possibilities presented by XForms, an emerging W3C standard (W3C Candidate Recommendation). The package consists of two main components: the data model component and the client component.
The data model component provides a set of Java APIs for creating, accessing, and modifying XForms data models. This package also includes a JSP tag library that provides a set of tags for use inside JSPs. The tag library interfaces with the XForms data model component APIs, thus providing JSP authors a means of accessing these APIs from within their JSPs. A detailed description of the data model APIs and the tag library, as well as their use, can be found in the documentation for the XML Forms data model.
SOAP for CICS (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/soap4cics)
SOAP for CICS (Customer Information Control System) is a tool that allows integration with SOAP messaging to new and existing CICS Transaction Server (TS) applications. This support for CICS TS enables the writing and deploying of CICS applications that process SOAP messages. This technology preview is suitable for prototyping applications and for investigating SOAP technologies. SOAP for CICS provides a suite of linked CICS application programs that form a pipeline for processing SOAP messages. The technology makes use of both CICS HTTP support and WebSphere MQ support to provide the transport layer. It also uses a preview (included in the download) of outbound HTTP for CICS in order to access remote servers via HTTP.
IBM Reflexive User Interface Builder (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/rib)
The IBM Reflexive User Interface Builder is an application that constructs and renders graphical user interfaces (GUIs) for Java Swing and Eclipse Standard Widget Toolkit (SWT) based upon a descriptive XML document. (Java Swing is a rich GUI toolkit included with Java that provides operating system-independent GUI components. Eclipse SWT is an add-on GUI toolkit that takes advantage of host operating system GUI components for maximum host integration.) IBM Reflexive User Interface Builder is both a specification for a mark-up language in which to describe GUIs, and an engine for creating (and, if desired, rendering) them. This application can be used as a standalone application for testing and evaluating basic GUI layout and functionality, or it can be used as a library within the context of a Java application for creating and rendering GUIs for that application.
XML for Tables (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xtable)
XML for Tables provides an XML view of relational tables and a query of those views as if they were XML documents. Written in the Java language, XML for Tables enables the publishing of XML documents from relational data, thereby satisfying the requirements of Internet (business-to-business) applications and other XML-based applications while taking advantage of relational database technology and current storage of business data. XML for Tables translates XQuery into SQL and pushes down SQL to DB2. SQL queries produce output in tuple format; XML for Tables tags the tuple result into XML so the XQuery results are in an XML document. XML for Tables is wrapped as DB2 stored procedures, and queries are submitted by calling the stored procedures.
XML Processing Plus Plus (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xmlprocessingplusplus)
XML Processing Plus Plus is a simple and powerful XML processing language: It is built on top of Java technology, it is API-independent, and it supports type-checking. XML Processing Plus Plus supports standard Java-XML APIs and it will work with other XML applications. Its simple, stream-based APIs and type-checking facility make XML programming easy. The XML Processing Plus Plus compiler converts programs written in this language's syntax into Java code that uses standard XML APIs. The language itself provides simple wrapper APIs: XmlIn and XmlOut. XmlIn is used for retrieving data from XML input streams, and XmlOut for inserting data to XML output streams.
Informix XSLT DataBlade (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/xsltblade)
The IBM Informix XSLT DataBlade module creates new SQL functions (which are called user-defined routines (UDRs)) that allow transformation of documents from one format to another using XSLT stylesheets and libxslt (the Gnome C XSLT library). The first release of the IBM Informix XSLT DataBlade, Version 1.0, supports the storing of XSLT stylesheets and documents in the built-in Informix LVARCHAR and CLOB data types. It also supports the IBM Informix Web DataBlade HTML data type.
Stylesheet Splicer (http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/styler)
Stylesheet Splicer is a customizable stylesheet processor that also manages multiple versions of XSL stylesheets from a common XSLT code base. Stylesheet Splicer overcomes restrictions in the XSLT language to bring "Makefile efficiency" to the management of a library of stylesheets. A single XSL stylesheet, with a stylesheet processor such as Stylesheet Splicer, will transform a source XML document from one format (such as ColdFusion CFXML) into a target XML document of another format (such as Rosetta PIP). Usually nodes and values not present in the source document are added. When a variety of target documents is required, a number of different stylesheets are usually prepared with extensive duplication among them. With Stylesheet Splicer, multiple stylesheets may be segmented into their unique component parts, without duplication, and assembled dynamically for the particular target variation desired.
Cynthya Peranandam is a Technology Strategist with IBM alphaWorks, a group within IBM that promotes emerging technologies from IBM research and development laboratories to an early-adopter developer audience. Ms. Peranandam has also held positions as a strategist with IBM Global Services at the Center for e-Business Innovation in Los Angeles, as well as other positions in the technology industry. She is a graduate of York University in Toronto and the Executive Program at the Anderson Graduate School of Management, UCLA. You can reach her at cynthya@us.ibm.com.
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