Monday, October 21, 2002

The Inevitable XML-ization of Directories This brief posting on Advisor.com sounds interesting. IBM has posted a tool to its AlphaWorks site that helps developers convert both SQL and LDAP data to and from XML. At Burton Group, we've been talking for some time about the need to make directory data accessible to XML-based applications, tools, and developers. While DSML 2.0 promises to achieve that goal, it requires knowledge of the LDAP protocol on the part of the developer. A tool like this might let an LDAP-aware directory manager simply output data from the directory in a fashion that XML developers understand, independently of their LDAP expertise. That means LDAP directory administrators could start making the directory more useful to application developers. And isn't that the whole point? 11:45:53 AM