ICE Authoring Group Seeks Comment on ICE2 Draft Use Cases

ALEXANDRIA, VA (June 6, 2002) - IDEAlliance and the ICE (Information and Content Exchange) Authoring Group have announced an open comment period for the Draft Use Cases for ICE2 Specification.

According to Dr. Richard Martin, Chairman of the ICE2 Specification Development Committee, "For the next version of the ICE protocol, it is critical to consider integration of Web Services' related standards for the ICE2 definition. Given that syndication was one of the first XML-based web services (ICE won the Seybold Technology Trailblazer award for 1998), it only makes sense that with ICE2 the ICE Authoring Group would endorse the foundational standards that have emerged to support web services. Building on the Web Services standards will make ICE easier for learn and implement."

The ICE Authoring Group and IDEAlliance are now seeking comments or any other feedback from firms who have interest in putting the proposed ICE2 specification to use. The tentative release date for the ICE2 specification is September 2002. The deadline for comments is June 17, and additional use cases will be accepted through June 30.

We're real excited about this," added Martin. "So far we've gotten a lot of support from the working groups, as well as companies like Vignette, Oracle, Active Data Exchange, Syndic8, and other members of the RSS community."

"Thousands of companies are using ICE-based products from vendors such as Active Data Exchange, Haht Commerce, Intershop, Macromedia, Oracle, Quark, Stellent, Vignette and Xenosys," commented ICE Authoring Group chair Laird Popkin. "The work we're doing to update the standard will make it easier to automate even more tasks and will help knit the digital economy more tightly together."

ICE2 identified and released a requirements document in February of 2002 which was based upon the lessons learned during the past four years of ICE implementations. With the present innovations taking place in the XML community, the ICE Authoring Group has reviewed and is refining ICE to meet the growing demands of businesses. The goal is to express the ICE2 content syndication standard as a Web Service. This first major revision of the ICE Specification focuses on compatibility with the three major Web Services Standards æ WSDL, SOAP and UDDI.

David Steinhardt, President and CEO of IDEAlliance, said, "We are opening the technical development and seek input from the entire industry to ensure that ICE2 meets the requirements of the broader community."

Development of the ICE2 specification is an open industry activity, and user participation is welcomed. The draft Use Cases are available for download in PDF format at www.icestandard.org. To learn more about participation in the ICE development activity, e-mail Laird Popkin, Chairman of the ICE Authoring Group, at laird@io.com or Dr. Richard Martin, Vice Chairman of the ICE-AG and Chairman of the ICE2 development effort, at rmartin@activedatax.com. ICE members encourage participation through the ICE-DEV@yahoogroups.com or through joining the ICE-AG and IDEAlliance.

About ICE and the ICE Authoring Group

ICE (Information and Content Exchange) is a key industry initiative hosted by IDEAlliance and sponsored by a group of companies who have a common interest in solving the problem of automating and managing the exchange of every type of content. The group consists of software developers and companies who distribute or consume content, whether commercially or within intranet and extranet frameworks. The ICE standard reduces the cost of doing business online and increases the value of B2B relationships. ICE facilitates the controlled exchange and management of electronic assets between networked partners and affiliates. Applications based on ICE allow companies to easily construct syndicated publishing networks, Web superstores, and online reseller channels by establishing Web site-to-Web site information networks. The ICE Authoring Group is open to all companies and include companies such as Adobe Systems, Vignette, Active Data Exchange, Oracle, and Tribune Media Services. Learn more about ICE at www.icestandard.org.

IDEAlliance (International Digital Enterprise Alliance) is a not-for-profit membership organization. Its mission is to advance user-driven, cross-industry solutions for all publishing and content-related processes by developing standards, fostering business alliances, and identifying best practices. IDEAlliance has been a leader in information technologies since 1966 (founded as Graphic Communications Association) having fostered the development and adoption of standards such as ADIS, GRACoL, ICE, JIFFI, Mail.dat, papiNet, PRISM, PROSE XML, SPACE XML, SGML, and XML. Learn more about IDEAlliance at www.idealliance.org.

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Contact

Richard Martin
Active Data Exchange, Inc.
610.997.8210
rmartin@activedatax.com