CLEAR METHODS CO-FOUNDER SPEAKS AT WEB SERVICES/XML INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE AND EXPO

(PRWEB) October 16, 2003

CLEAR METHODS CO-FOUNDER SPEAKS AT

WEB SERVICES/XML INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE AND EXPO

Michael Plusch to deliver talks on XML, the Water Language, and Web services

Cambridge, Mass.(PRWEB) October 14, 2003 – Clear Methods (http://www.clearmethods.com), a startup providing advanced XML and Web services technology, today announced its co-founder and CEO Michael Plusch will speak at the Web Services/XML International Conference and Expo. Plusch will deliver six sessions at the conference which runs from October 14 to 16 in Toronto, Canada. With 7 events housed under one roof, the conference bills itself as “the biggest and the most significant global IT event”.

Plusch’s six sessions include: “Cleaning up XML’s Tower of Babel with Water”, about an alternative to the dozen or more special-purpose languages required for Web service applications; “Semantic Web Services in Water”, describing how new technologies make it possible to simply and flexibly automate business processes; “Teaching Programming With XML and Web Services”, discussing what makes a language ideal for educators; “XML Sucks”, a colorfully-named session about the strengths and weakness of XML and how it can be most effectively harnessed; “Water: All-Purpose Language for XML and Web Services”, a session about a dynamic language that elegantly unites the worlds of objects and Web services”.; and “Water Contract: A Flexible Schema Language for XML”, introducing a new schema language for XML that is simple, expressive, and unambiguous”. (See accompanying page for a more detailed summary of each session.)

To register for the Web Services/XML International Conference and Expo, please visit http://www.wowgao.com/it_combo/register/reg_attendees_register.php or call 416-292-0038 ext. 811.

About Clear Methods

Clear Methods provides enterprises and independent software vendors with advanced Web services technology and solutions that dramatically speed the creation of flexible business software. The Clear Methods Steam platform is a pure Web services environment that enables the use of XML throughout the software lifecycle. Steam provides a compact, uniform, standards-based commercial product set for the open Water language.

Founded in 2001, Clear Methods is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Clear Methods Sessions at Web Services/XML International Conference and Expo, October 14-16, 2004

Cleaning up XML’s Tower of Babel with Water

Developing Web services applications in J2EE or .NET typically requires a dozen or more special-purpose languages and XML vocabularies. This session explores in detail a much less complex alternative: Water, a language designed from the ground up for XML and Web services. Water is an open, all-purpose language for developing business software. It is dynamic, fully object-oriented and uses ConciseXML syntax. Water is able to bridge the gap between business logic and XML data. It easily integrates Java, XML, and HTML and runs on any platform with a JVM. The result is a dramatic simplification that reduces the cost of building and maintaining Web services and XML software. Water adheres to a “Learn Once, Use Everywhere” approach and eliminates the need for the special-purpose languages that complicate software development. A look at the Water language is available at http://www.waterlanguage.com.

The speaker uses live, interactive examples to show how Water simplifies Web application development and maintenance. Attendees will learn how the Water language more easily provides the capabilities of special-purpose languages, including: JSP/ASP, XHTML, CSS, XSLT, XPATH, SAX, DTD, XML Schema, XSD, SOAP, WSDL, JavaScript, Java/C#, and SQL. The new ConciseXML syntax is also discussed.

XML Sucks

Why is working with XML so difficult? Why are there so many different ways to manipulate XML, none of which seem natural? The major vendors are committed to XML and Web services, but they primarily attempt to hide the XML under tools and wizards. This seminar looks at the limitations of XML, inherited from its roots in SGML. XML is said to be “self-describing” and a “lingua franca”, but in many ways falls far short of these descriptions. The acronym XML stands for Extensible Markup Language, but XML is actually a markup syntax. In reality, the XML syntax is neither a language nor is it extensible. Plusch shows examples from popular standards to illustrate the many inconsistent ways XML syntax is used for representing data. By understanding how the XML 1.0 syntax has multiple representations for the same data, you will be better able to decode XML data and improve your use of XML. An alternative markup syntax called ConciseXML will be described and compared with XML. ConciseXML is an open specification that overcomes the constraints of XML for representing data and logic.

Water: All-Purpose Language for XML and Web Services

Water is a new all-purpose programming language that allows you to program in an XML syntax. This session is all about a dynamic language that elegantly unites the worlds of objects and Web services. Water adheres to a “Learn Once, Use Everywhere” philosophy where data, logic, and presentation are manipulated and represented in a consistent way. As an All-Level Language it can be used for both high-level and low-level tasks. Water makes it possible to design, build, and deploy software entirely with XML and Web services. The language specification is openly documented and a free runtime is available for commercial use. Water is particularly well-suited for building high-level languages including declarative or modeling languages. The Water language was influenced by many other languages such as Scheme, Java, HTML, Lisp, Self, Smalltalk, Basic, ML, and Dylan. Water has both the power of Lisp and the ease of use of Basic.

Teaching Programming With XML and Web Services

What role should XML and Web services play in education? How do XML and Web services relate to existing programming courses and the computer science curriculum? What would a course on XML consist of? How should XML be introduced into the curriculum? Some schools are using HTML as a gentle path into programming. Pascal was once the dominant teaching language, but now Java, Basic, Scheme, Logo, and JavaScript are all used in various teaching roles. Where should XML and Web services fit in the teaching of programming and computer science? Is there an easy-to-learn language that could introduce the student to both programming and Web services? Web services potentially offer an excellent base for teaching distributed programming. Educators need a simple, expressive language that provides marketable skills. Java, a language which has been used for teaching computer science, is felt to be too complex. What other options are available? Plusch will lead a discussion with educators on sharing ideas about what works and what options are available. The new Water language will be described and proposed as an ideal language for teaching programming using XML and Web services.

Water Contract: A Flexible Schema Language for XML

When XML data is sent between partners, it is vital to be able to accurately describe the valid structure of the data. Schema languages are used to describe XML interfaces and data structures, but the complexity of existing schema languages such as W3C XML Schema is a major problem. In most cases, people prefer to use examples to convey the structure of an XML document, rather than using a schema language. Tools can generate XML Schema, but the resulting output is very difficult to understand. Even the W3C itself uses examples extensively to avoid the use of its own XML Schema language in specifications. Water Contract is a new schema language for XML that is simple, expressive, and unambiguous. Water Contract was designed to clearly and precisely describe XML interfaces and data structures. Water Contract uses ConciseXML syntax and is so concise that it can be easily read in a text editor without the need for graphical tools. Water Contract is flexible enough to simply represent any business constraint or policy. This talk is example-driven using live examples from the audience, and no wizards or code generators will be used to create Water Contracts. Plusch will also use examples to compare Water Contract to W3C XML Schema and DTDs. By the end of the seminar, attendees will be able to read and write a Water Contract.

Semantic Web Services in Water

Web services and the Semantic Web are ushering in the era of a machine-understandable Web. The result will be unprecedented efficiency in automating business across the Web. Semantic Web services represent the convergence of Web services with the Semantic Web started by Tim Berners-Lee. Water, a new XML-based language, is a leading candidate for dramatically simplifying the creation of Semantic Web services.

Plusch’s talk describes how these technologies make it possible to simply and flexibly automate business processes. The demonstration features creating Semantic Web services on-the-fly without using Wizards or code-generation.

About The Speaker

Mike Plusch is the co-creator of the open Water language. He has written two books on Water including Water: Simplified Web Services and XML Programming, published by Wiley.

Plusch holds two bachelor degrees from MIT in Management ’92 and Computer Science ’93 and was a senior architect at Bowstreet, a pioneer in Web services. He is the founder, CEO and CTO of Clear Methods which is headquartered in Cambridge, MA. Clear Methods is a startup providing advanced XML and Web services technology. The Clear Methods Steam XML platform is a complete runtime and development environment for XML and Web services, making it possible to use XML throughout the entire software lifecycle.

Copyright © 2003 Clear Methods, Inc.

All Rights Reserved.

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CLEAR METHODS CO-FOUNDER SPEAKS AT WEB SERVICES/XML INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE AND EXPO