Your right, I overstated my case. I can see having different software for
communications and for transformation. My point was more that as new
technologies or standards are available they don't replace the older ones.
How many mapping tools should a company buy. One for EDI, one for internal
application to application and another for XML? How many API's to SAP or
Baan or other should one build? One per mapper?
If you already have an EDI translator and are happy with it, but have to add
on XML support, you may be happy with a bolt on EDI to XML mapper. But if
your going to be looking at new mappers, look for one that does both.
Tim
-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Mattias
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: 10/22/00 3:01 PM
Subject: Re: Harbinger e5
On 10/22/00 Tim Cronin opined..
> It isn't EDI or XML, VAN vs. Internet. A product has to support all
options
> with true any to any mapping capability..... It has to support
routing,
and
> intergration with major applications. The tool has to be just as good
for
> internal app to app integration as it is with external integration. I
would
> never buy a product that was just an EDI translator. I would also
never
buy
> an intercompany application to application integration solution that
didn't
> support EDI....
I must disagree. If I need to get from here (Racine WI) to an address
certain in Philadelphia PA, the *only* way to do that with a single
conveyance product is to take an automobile. Seems to me multiple
conveyances - taking the shuttle bus to Mitchell Field, an airplane to
Philadelphia and then renting a car to go to the address - is a much
better
application-specific solution.
Similarly, why not look at separate products to...
1. Communicate with a VAN/FTP site
2. Translate EDI and/or XML and/or whatever into a generic format.
3. Using a mapping product or 3GL program to integrate into the
application.
Mercator Software has a great "any-to-any" mapping product; but their PC
EDI
offering (Trading Partner PC/32) is, well, limited. (They should thank
me
for the kind word, "limited").
Harbinger/Peregine TLW has a very nice user interface for
operator-attended
communications and data entry, but it's so slow and just buggy enough
I'd be
loathe to use it in a high-volume batch environment.
Gentran/400 is really nice for taking inbound EDI and moving to a flat
file;
the outbound capabilities are not very powerful at all unless you're
pretty
handy writing application programs to put the data into a format it
likes.
TSI's Trading Partner/MVS has a great outbound API system - powerful if
you
can write programs, terrible if you don't; inbound, I find their "screen
definitions" and "extract formatting" to be really obtuse and usually
irrelevant in a mainframe environment.
What's so wrong with picking cherries based on the specific application?
Yeah, it's convenient to have everything in one product, but get real:
above
I list three very respected companies, none of which has a solution for
every possible circumstance, but each of which offers an outstanding
product
for at least one aspect of the total application requirement.
IMSNHO, a multiple product solution should never be 'off the table' from
day
one.
Michael C. Mattias
Tal Systems
Racine WI
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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