TUESDAY, MARCH 31, 2009

Altova Software Version 2009 SP1 Available

Today we released Service Pack 1 of Altova Version 2009 product line (v2009 SP1),
which includes helpful bug fixes and other enhancements, as well as a new feature in
the MapForce data mapping tool (detailed below).

v2009 SP1 is a free update for all v2009 customers, as well as any customer with a
valid Support and Maintenance Package.

Note that v2009 SP1 is a new product version, and not a patch - you can
simply visit the Altova Download Page to download and install the latest
version of your product(s) to update.

Recursive User Defined Functions

Added based on feedback from Altova partners, this new feature in MapForce 2009
SP1 provides support for non-inlined user-defined functions in data mapping
projects. Now users can create recursive function calls, enabling them to map data
dynamically by expressing operations in terms of themselves.

In hierarchical data structures like XML, for instance, it is possible for an element to
contain itself or be referenced, in some way or another, by a descendant. Creating a
recursive user-defined function allows you to process this data, looping through the
elements incrementally and returning data that has been evaluated dynamically.

Update to get this new functionality and all the v2009 SP1 enhancements across the
Altova product line. If you're not already a v2009 customer, you can download a
free, fully functional trial using the same link.

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LABELS: ALTOVA, MAPFORCE, MISSIONKIT, V2009

THURSDAY, MARCH 26, 2009

SOA and Cloud Services Within Your Budget
The hardships affecting today's economy present new challenges for organizations.
Interdepartmental budgets are being cut, and large purchases are being carefully
scrutinized. Costly enterprise software and mainframe computing systems that once
held promise are being reconsidered on a global scale in favor of more agile,
component-based systems that cut costs and increase efficiency with forward-
thinking concepts like Service-oriented Architecture (SOA) and cloud computing.

These architectural concepts incorporate modern technologies and object-oriented

approaches to solve real-world technology issues in complex environments while
decreasing maintenance, integration, and deployment costs with modular design and
component re-use.

The Altova MissionKit is a highly affordable toolset uniquely suited to address this
shift toward more flexible and lightweight infrastructure. With strong support for
XML, UML, databases, and data integration technologies, the MissionKit offers all of
the tools necessary to build agile architectures replete with repeatable services,
reusable components, and scalable resources.

SOA & Cloud Computing

SOA and Web/cloud services are two of the strongest buzzwords in technology
today. Though they have some clear differences, both of these concepts represent a
paradigm shift from large-scale enterprise systems to service-based architectures
built on modular components and reusable functionality.

The SOA approach aims to help organizations respond more quickly to business
requirements by packaging processes as a network of interoperable and repeatable
services. This modularity creates system flexibility and gives developers the agility
required to build new capabilities into the current system as needed - without
reinventing the proverbial wheel. SOA is essentially a series of interconnected and
self-contained services, the functionality of which is dynamically located and invoked
based on certain criteria, communicated in messages. At the heart of SOA is a high
level of component reuse that drives down costs and increases efficiency in a fully
scalable architecture.
Cloud services build upon the concept of interoperable services, adding a
virtualization component to help relieve internal servers from being overtaxed by the
constant reuse of these services within the system. This paradigm uses the Internet
and Internet-enabled technologies to increase performance and processing speed by
storing information permanently in the "cloud" and caching it only temporarily on
client machines. Cloud computing implementation is a powerful option for increasing
system capacity and capabilities by leveraging next-generation data centers in
combination with the World Wide Web.

Both SOA and cloud computing seek to alleviate problems created by inflexible
architectures that rely heavily on tightly coupled enterprise application infrastructure.
This focus on interoperability and independent software services reveals a distributed
solution that is event-driven, flexible, and cost conscious in almost any setting.

Anatomy of a Service-based Architecture

Since their inception, XML and Web services have been continuously gaining
notoriety as the standards of choice for secure, efficient, and platform-independent
data exchange between software applications and over the Internet. XML provides
the foundation for the protocols that power Web services infrastructure: WSDL (Web
Services Description Language) and SOAP, an XML-based messaging standard. Web
services are hardware, programming language, and operating system independent,
meaning that they are duly amenable to the seamless and interoperable exchange of
data over a network and uniquely suited to component-based systems.

Web services architecture

Both SOA and cloud-based architectures generally rely on WSDL to describe
interaction and functionality and locate operating components within the system.
WSDL works hand-in-hand with SOAP, a messaging protocol used by the client
application to invoke the methods and functions defined in the WSDL description.

The example below is the stock quote example used in the W3C WSDL
specification and describes a simple, single operation service that retrieves real-time
stock prices based on ticker symbol input. Of course, most services that exist within
enterprise architectures are far more complex.

Take, for example, the publicly available Amazon Web services, which provide
accessible Cloud services and infrastructure to a growing number of companies
worldwide, including Twitter,SmugMug, and WordPress.com. These services
essentially allow independent organizations to rent some of the immense power built
into the Amazon distributed computing environment and add the same scalability,
reliability, and scalability to their online presence at a fraction of the price. The much
anticipated Windows Azure from Microsoft® operates on a similar model, giving
developers the opportunity to build and deploy cloud-based applications with minimal
on-site resources.

Amazon provides a WSDL file that contains the definition of the Web service, the
requests that the service accepts, and so on. Developers can then write a SOAP-
based client application that invokes the Amazon Web service for the functionality it
provides. (At this time Amazon provides a number of Cloud-based services for
application hosting, backup and storage, content delivery, e-commerce, search, and
high-performance computing.)

Altova MissionKit

Recently named "Best Development Environment" in the Jolt Product Excellence

Awards, the Altova MissionKit is a diverse set of software tools that provides scalable
options for leveraging your current software assets in an SOA or cloud-enabled
environment. Strong support for XML, Web services, data integration, process
automation, and databases, as well as accessibility to powerful APIs give developers
flexible options for creating service-based solutions and an affordable alternative to
costly consultant fees, extract/transform/load (ETL) tools, and/or enterprise service
bus (ESB) products.

The Altova MissionKit* supports end-to-end Web services development and includes
a graphical WSDL editor, visual Web services builder, advanced capabilities for
managing WSDL and other XML file relationships, a SOAP client and debugger, WSDL
data integration, code generation, and more. Together, all of these features provide
a robust solution for integrating disparate services and systems in a distributed
computing environment, whether the components be in-house, network, or Cloud-
based.

WSDL Editor

The XMLSpy XML editor provides a graphical interface (GUI) for designing and editing
WSDL documents. The structure and components of the WSDL are created in the
main design window using graphical design mechanisms (with tabs allowing users to
toggle back and forth between text view), and additional editing capabilities are
enabled from comprehensive entry helper windows. Users can easily create and edit
messages, types, operations, portTypes, bindings, etc., inline.

In addition, publicly maintained WSDL files like the Amazon Simple Storage Service,
or Amazon S3, (below) can be opened instantly using the Open URL command in
XMLSpy.
XMLSpy's WSDL editor gives developers a sophisticated environment for rapid Web
services development, managing WSDL syntax and validation through an intuitive,
drag and drop graphical interface. The addition of a documentation generation
feature makes it possible to share the complete details of a Web service interface
with non-technical stakeholders in HTML or Microsoft Word.

SOAP Client

SOAP requests can be manually created in XMLSpy's SOAP client based on the
operations defined in the WSDL. Once an operation is selected, XMLSpy initiates the
request based on the connections provided in the WSDL and displays the XML syntax
of the SOAP envelope in the main window. The message can then be sent directly to
the server for an immediate response.
SOAP Debugger

XMLSpy also includes a SOAP debugger, which acts as Web services proxy between
client and server, enabling developers to analyze WSDL files and their SOAP
message components, single-step through transactions, set breakpoints on SOAP
functions, and even define conditional breakpoints that are triggered by a stated
XPath query.

Building Web Services

Once a WSDL definition is complete, it can also be visually implemented using
MapForce, Altova's any-to-any data integration tool. MapForce gives users the ability
to map data to or from WSDL operations and then autogenerate program code in
Java or C#. Tight integration with Visual Studio and Eclipse makes it possible to then
compile the code within either of these IDEs and deploy the service on the client
machine.

When you create a new Web service project by specifying a Web services definition
file (WSDL), MapForce automatically generates mapping files for each individual
SOAP operation.

The SOAP input and output messages can then be easily mapped to other source
data components (XML, databases, flat files, EDI, XBRL, Excel 2007) to create a
complete Web services operation. Data processing functions, filters, and constants
can also be inserted to convert the data on the fly.
MapForce can autogenerate Web services implementation code in Java or C# for
server-side implementation, and it is also accessible for automation via the command
line.

File Relationship Management

For complex Web-based applications that include a large number of disparate files
and project stakeholders, the MissionKit offers an advanced graphical XML file
relationship management tool in SchemaAgent. SchemaAgent can analyze and
manage relationships among XML Schemas, XML instance documents (SOAP), WSDL,
and XSLT files. The client/server option enables any changes to be visualized in real
time across a workgroup.
This gives organizations the ability to track and manage their mission critical SOA
files as reusable individual components, reducing development time and the
occurrence of errors.

Data Integration

A key factor of any SOA is the ability for disparate systems to communicate
seamlessly via automated processes. As an any-to-any graphical data integration
and Web services implementation tool, MapForce facilitates this undertaking with
support for a wide variety of data formats including XML, databases, flat files (which
can be easily parsed for integration with legacy systems with the help of the
unique FlexText™ utility), EDI, XBRL, Excel 2007, and Web services.
MapForce supports complex data mapping scenarios with multiple sources and
targets and advanced data processing functions. Transformations can easily be
automated via code generation in C#, C++, or Java, or the command line. Full
integration with Visual Studio and Eclipse also makes this an ideal development tool
for working in large-scale enterprise projects - without the heavy price tag.

This gives developers a flexible and agile middleware component that can work in
virtually any service-based architecture. The ability to integrate disparate data in on-
the-fly is a key requirement in real-world enterprise and cross-enterprise systems
where legacy systems and other less flexible formats co-exist with XML and other
modern, interoperable standards.

Database Management
Even in the rapidly evolving semantics-driven macrocosm that is Web 2.0, most
companies still use one or more relational databases to store and manage their
internal data assets. The Altova MissionKit supports working with the most prevalent
of these systems (see listing below) in a wide variety of different ways. Database
support is offered in XMLSpy, MapForce, StyleVision, and, of course, DatabaseSpy.

• Microsoft® SQL Server® 2000, 2005, 2008

• IBM DB2® 8, 9
• IBM DB2 for iSeries® v5.4
• IBM DB2 for zSeries® 8, 9
• Oracle® 9i, 10g, 11g
• Sybase® 12
• MySQL® 4, 5
• PostgreSQL 8
• Microsoft Access™ 2003, 2007

DatabaseSpy is a multi-database query, editing, design, and comparison tool that

allows users to connect directly to all major databases and edit data and design
structure in a graphical user interface with features like table browsing, data editing,
SQL auto-completion entry helpers, visual table design, content diff/merging, and
multiple export formats.

In a service-based architecture, the ability to compare and merge data directly in its
native database format is an enormous asset to developers who need to locate
changes, migrate differences, or synchronize versions of database tables across test
and live environments.
As a component of the MissionKit, DatabaseSpy gives disparate groups within
organizations the flexibility to work with data from multiple databases in one central
interface simultaneously. Whether this data is eventually integrated into other
systems or applications or lives permanently in the database, DatabaseSpy provides
a simple and flexible solution to managing and maintaining massive data stores.

Single Source Publishing

In today's world of highly automated data transfer and management, it is still

necessary for human readers to ultimately consume the data in some format or
other. Of course, the problem that organizations often run into is what format to
publish to. XML and single source publishing have revolutionized content
management, document exchange, and even multilingual communications by
separating content structure from appearance. An XML-based documentation system
can greatly reduce costs through facilitating ease of conversion for delivery to many
different data formats and types of applications. The single source concept ensures
that workflow processes (i.e., conversion, edits, etc.) do not have to be repeated or
reworked – that all content in the repository requires only minimal restructuring and
promotion before being loaded to respective applications for delivery.

Altova StyleVision is a graphical stylesheet design tool that enables users to easily
apply single source publishing to XML, XBRL, and database content, without having
any affect on the source data. In this way, companies can create reusable template
designs for data that can then be rendered automatically in HTML, RTF, PDF,
Microsoft Word 2007, and even an Authentic e-Form for immediate publication to any
conceivable medium without any process disruption - resulting in the presentation of
accurate, consistent, and standardized information in real-time.
Single source publishing gives organizations the ability to add a human component
to their highly automated data processing workflows, enabling them to view
transmission reports at any stage. For example, in a world where compliance
management plays such a large role in day to day enterprise operations, StyleVision
can be integrated into any SOA to provide a sort of visual audit trail for manually
reviewing XML, XBRL, and database transactions. StyleVision's template-based
approach to stylesheet design makes it an ideal addition to a distributed
development environment, where repeatable processes are an integral part of the
system's overall efficiency.

Conclusions

Financial downturns can make investing in technology a difficult decision. However,

forward-thinking organizations will find that focusing on restructuring the legacy
assets they already have in place, automating internal processes, and adding
virtualization layer to their application infrastructure can lead to increases in
efficiency, speed, and potentially enormous ROI.

The Altova MissionKit gives businesses all of the tools that they need to augment
their enterprise architecture with iterative, process-driven solutions that will recover
costs through the reuse of current assets and the ability to deliver Web-driven
automation within and across organizations on a global scale. The MissionKit is a
highly affordable solution that offers developers, software architects, and IT users all
of the tools they need to build flexible and powerful technology solutions and
efficiencies that advance component-based service-oriented infrastructure - without
breaking the budget.

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LABELS: CLOUD SERVICES, DATA MAPPING, DATABASE TOOL, LEGACY

DATA, MISSIONKIT, SINGLE SOURCE PUBLISHING, SOA, SOFTWARE TOOLS, XML

EDITOR
THURSDAY, MARCH 19, 2009

Exploring Large XML/XBRL Documents with XMLSpy

Last week, while giving a demo of the new XBRL capabilities in the Altova MissionKit,
we stumbled across an interesting question: What is the best way for a semi-
technical SME (in this case a CPA) to navigate a large XML/XBRL document for data
entry?

XMLSpy, which is included in the MissionKit tool suite, has a lot of cool features and
different views for XML data, including the ever-popular grid view for visualizing the
hierarchical structure of an instance document in a graphical manner. The ability to
easily expand and collapse containers and drag and drop to change position
makes XMLSpy’s grid view a pretty good choice for the task.

Of course let’s not forget that the XMLSpy XML editor also has a Find feature that
would enable users to simply press Ctrl F or use the Find in Files window to find any
element that they are looking for… but alas, in the case of XBRL, where element
names are mindbogglingly verbose, this may be a challenge. Consider, for example,
the US-GAAP’s aptly named
<us-
gaap:IncomeLossFromContinuingOperationsBeforeIncomeTaxesMinorityInterestAnd

IncomeLossFromEquityMethodInvestments>.

Not so much fun to type into a Find dialog...

Our solution, therefore, and the winner for the easiest and most comprehensive way
for even a non-technical user to find XML elements in a large document, utilizes a
combination of longstanding XMLSpy features (the XPath Analyzer window) and
a new feature in XMLSpy v2009, XPath auto-completion. Simply begin typing the
element name in the XPath Analyzer window, and XMLSpy will show you all of the
possibilities. Next, choose the one you are looking for, and XMLSpy will navigate
directly to that node in the XML document.

Now that was easy! And better yet, you get to tell your friends that you know
XPath. ;)

Of course, for developers, intelligent XPath auto-completion provides a lot more than
the ability to find a node quickly. As you type, it provides you with valid XPath
functions, as well as element and attribute names from the associated schema and
XML instance(s). XMLSpy accounts for namespaces when listing options and even
provides deep path suggestions when the required node is not in close proximity to
the current context.

XMLSpy is available standalone or as part of the award-winning MissionKit tool suite.

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LABELS: MISSIONKIT, XBRL, XMLSPY, XPATH

FRIDAY, MARCH 13, 2009

Teach DiffDog a New Trick

Teach DiffDog a New Trick

You can easily train DiffDog, Altova’s diff/merge tool for files, directories, and
databases, to correctly interpret new file types.

For instance, more and more file standards are taking advantage of the Zip
compression format to deliver entire sets of files in a single convenient package.
Let’s say you want to use DiffDog to examine and compare files created by Google
Earth that are saved in .kmz archives.

When you initially open a folder containing .kmz documents, then attempt to
compare two files in a DiffDog document window, DiffDog reports the .kmz files
contain binary content:
All you have to do is add the .kmz file extension in the File Types tab of the DiffDog
Options dialog:
And click the Zip conformant radio button to assign the correct behavior:
Now that DiffDog understands the .kmz file extension is a Zip archive, it expands
the Directory compare window to list all the component files.
You can see differences inside the archives. When you double-click any file pair,
DiffDog automatically fetches them from the Zip archives and presents them for
interactive editing in a new File Compare window. However, some of the file types
enclosed in the Zip archive are also unknown. We learned from reading the XML
Aficionado blog entry on Google Earth and XMLSpythat .kml files are an open XML-
based standard for geo-spatial information.

We can add .kml to DiffDog files types and specify XML-conformant syntax coloring:
Now DiffDog displays the files with syntax coloring and we can apply all the
DiffDog XML-aware differencing functionality.
If you dig deeper into the .kmz archive, you’ll discover .dae files are also XML-based.
After you add .dae to the DiffDog files list and set it as XML-compliant, give yourself
a treat!
DiffDog is available as a standalone tool or as part of the Altova MissionKit tool suite.
The recently released DiffDog Version 2009 added powerful database content
diff/merge capabilities - take a free trial for a walk around the block.

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LABELS: DIFF MERGE TOOL, DIFFDOG

THURSDAY, MARCH 12, 2009

Altova MissionKit Wins Prestigious Jolt Award

We are very excited to announce that the Altova MissionKit won the Jolt Product
Excellence Award for Best Development Environment last night!
Lauded as the "Oscars of the Software Development Industry," the Jolt Product
Excellence and Productivity Awards are presented each year to products that have
"jolted" the industry with their significance and made the task of creating software
faster, easier, and more efficient. According to their Web site, the Jolt Awards,
"...recognize the most innovative, trend-making, ahead-of-the-curve products. Jolt-
award winners are the software products, books and technologies that developers
should be using today."

We are honored - and very proud - to be recognized with this designation for the
MissionKit, Altova's suite software development tools for XML, databases, and UML.
The unmatched functionality and tight integration between the tools in the MissionKit
have been designed from day one to make developers' lives easier, and we couldn't
be happier to have this recognized first and foremost by our customers and now by
this panel of distinguished Jolt Award judges!

The complete list of Jolt award winners has been posted, and more info and photos
will follow soon as they're available.

A big thank you to the Jolt judges, and congratulations to all the other Jolt Award
winners!

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LABELS: ALTOVA, AWARD, JOLT AWARD, MISSIONKIT

MONDAY, MARCH 9, 2009

What's New...To Me?

With each release, we update the Altova What's New page with many details and
screenshots describing all the functionality added to each product in the Altova
MissionKit. If you've ever visited the page, you know it's quite long -- and that's why
we only include information on the latest release. This is very helpful for the folks
who are one version behind, but what if it's been a while since you upgraded? You
can check out the New Features Index pages, which allow you to select the current
version of your product(s) to see everything that's been added since:
 • XMLSpy new features index
• MapForce new features index
• StyleVision new features index
• UModel new features index
• DatabaseSpy new features index
• DiffDog new features index
• SemanticWorks new features index
• SchemaAgent new features index

Of course, if you have an active Support and Maintenance Package, upgrades to the
latest version are free; but even if your SMP has expired, special upgrade pricing is
available. You can learn more by contacting the Altova Sales Team or entering your
license key code into the Upgrade Wizard to see all your options.

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LABELS: ALTOVA, ALTOVA PRODUCT UPGRADES, ALTOVA SUPPORT

THURSDAY, MARCH 5, 2009

What's New in MapForce 2009?

It feels like we’ve been writing about XBRL and HL7 for months... Let's move away
from that topic for the moment and talk about additional essential new functionality
added to MapForce in the v2009 release. Granted, some of these features have been
added as a necessity formapping to/from multi-dimensional XBRL data, but they also
transcend well beyond interactive financial data reporting to the other aspects of
mapping XML, database, flat file, EDI, Excel 2007, and Web services data in
MapForce.

Custom Functions for Data Mapping

MapForce functions add a custom data processing layer to your mappings, letting
you reformat output structure and even manipulate content on-the-fly. With v2009
we have added agrouping, distinct-values, and a predicated position function to
the already well-shelved MapForce function library.

Grouping functions can be selected for code generation in XSLT 2.0, Java, C#, and
C++ and let you effectively reorganize source data into based on common values:
 • group-by - reorganizes data in the output document based on a specified
common value, or grouping key
• group-adjacent - applies grouping to an alternating sequence of items,
assigning items that have a common value to the same group
• group-starts-with - begins a new group based on a specified pattern and
puts all subsequent items into the same group until another item matching
that pattern is found
• group-ends-with - ends a new group based on a specified pattern and puts
all subsequent items into the same group until another item matching that
pattern is found

The distinct-values function is a data filtering operation that, simply put,

automatically ignores duplicate input values when writing mapping output results.

MapForce also now includes a predicated position function that lets you filter out
data based on its context position in the input document. For example, the mapping
below will return data for only the first two people listed in the source document.
Extended Database Support
For users creating database mappings, MapForce 2009 provides new native support
for additional databases: Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Oracle 11g, and PostgreSQL 8.
It also now supports mapping XML fields in SQL Server. The complete list of natively
supported databases is:

• Microsoft® SQL Server® 2000, 2005, 2008

• IBM DB2® 8, 9
• IBM DB2 for iSeries® v5.4
• IBM DB2 for zSeries® 8, 9
• Oracle® 9i, 10g, 11g
• Sybase® 12
• MySQL® 4, 5
• PostgreSQL 8
• Microsoft Access™ 2003, 2007

Data Mapping Documentation

The ability to generate data mapping documentation makes it much easier to
collaborate on large data integration projects, which often include a variety of
designers, developers, subject matter experts, and stakeholders.
Find Dialog for Identifying Nodes
And now for a personal favorite: a new find feature. Yes, this may sound very simple
and mundane – unless you have had the pleasure of mapping large and complex
multi-layered data components like XBRL and EDI (there we go again!). Consider, for
example, digging through an HL7 ADT A05 transaction to find the second CWE
identifier field under the fifteenth PR1 segment.
Ahhh… much easier!!

Take a look at the full list of new features in MapForce v2009 – and, as always, keep
in mind that Altova adds new functionality to all of the MissionKit tools based on user
requests… so keep ‘em coming!

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LABELS: DATA MAPPING, MAPFORCE, V2009

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