Core Components
Core ComponentsAn important goal of ebXML messages is interoperability, defined here as the ability of companies in different industries to exchange and understand data among different business domains and technologies. To help achieve interoperability, ebXML defines a series of common data items called core components that appear in different business messages yet still have common meanings. These common meanings enable companies using business terms in one industry to relate those terms to their counterparts in another industry. Businesses will (and should) use their own terminology to do business, but they will also want to interact with other industries with the same kind of ease and purpose. Core components help realize that goal. As with business processes, the definition and management of core components will likely fall to industry organizations and standards bodies. Core components can get complex and political. The development of core components has lagged behind the rest of the ebXML initiative, and much of the hard work in this area remains. This section gives an overview of core components and samples of their use. An example from different supply-chain scenarios illustrates this issue. From one industry to the next , a product manufacturer can be referred to as a manufacturer, supplier, vendor, or factory. A wholesaler of goods can be called distributor, dealer , or merchant. A retailer may be known as a store or outlet. The person buying the goods can be called a customer, client, or end user . Figure 8.10 illustrates the function of core components, to find common synonyms for these words, using these different supply-chain terms. Figure 8.10. Core component examples. Figure 8.10 shows another feature of core components, namely the use of a neutral syntax to identify them. The chart calls the core components A, B, C, and D; in reality they have official dictionary names and unique identifiers. However, the use of a neutral syntax enables different industries to relate their particular business terms more easily to the core components. The neutral syntax also enables companies and industries to relate their existing EDI transactions and XML vocabularies to ebXML messages, by providing the same kind of common references used to relate different industries. The context for the terms provides still another important factor in determining core components. The context of a core component provides the specific business meaning of the data item, as determined by the business process and other variables , while the core component itself provides the basic interchangeable part. The term invoice, for example, usually means a statement of charges levied by one company on another. However, one can also use the term in the context of international shipping, where a commercial invoice lists line items, quantities , prices, and deliveries of a shipment, and is used to compute duties or generate letters of credit. In this case, the business process context changes the meaning of the term invoice, and the ebXML core components need to reflect these process-defined variations. ebXML provides a way of classifying the context of core components as one or a combination of the following categories:
Each of these categories can have different rules, called context rules, for modifying the core components, and the entries within the categories can also dictate different rules. For example, the process for making hotel reservations will vary depending on the type of customer. Individuals might call a telephone reservation number or log onto a web site, while businesses establishing corporate accounts go through an entirely different process. The process may also differ from one part of the world to another to reflect different legal constraints.[71] These sources of variation help explain why the definition of core components has been such a long and arduous process. Simple or basic core components can also be grouped together to form aggregate core components. The basic core component has no further logical or semantic subdivisions, but may have an extendable list of valid code values. Aggregate core components consist of multiple basic components, and may have rules on the maximum number of times an embedded component is allowed or the order of the components in the aggregate object.[72] Business messages in an industry will likely have data items unique to that industry, which in ebXML are called domain components, either basic or complex. If domain components find use outside the original industry, they can then become core components. Building a business document means assembling the collection of core and domain components, using the rules defined in the business process models for message structure, as well as other data items defined in the CPA and CPP documents.[73] ebXML provides a schema for assembling new electronic business documents, where the business process models may not have yet defined them.[74] ebXML has developed a partial list of core components as of April 2001. Table 8.1 gives some examples, with aggregate and embedded components, and shows the reusability of some items. Table 8.1. Sample Core Components[75]
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EAN: 2147483647
Pages: 100
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