Mark Ericson - Mindreef, Inc.

Distributed Learning

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 02:11:59 GMT

Chris Ferris shares some ideas for using technology in education. I'm also interested in applications of computer technology in education. My interest stems from experiences homeschooling my daughter and the possibilities of virtual classrooms. My title is intended to be 'Distributed...

The Ultimate WS-* specification

Fri, 21 Jan 2005 00:22:11 GMT

There are so many Web services standards sometimes its hard to know where to start. Fortunately I discovered one essential standard that is a must read for everyone. This new WS specification is WS-! (pronounced "Wizbang"). As the name implies, Wizbang will do anything and everything! Read on for the complete specification for Wizbang (don't blink).

A Perspective on SOA - No More Tiers

Tue, 11 Jan 2005 04:53:32 GMT

In a previous article I described Web Services as "just right" granularity of software components. These software components are potentially deployed distributed across potentially many servers and shared to compose applications. It is interesting to note that these new components are servers, responding to remote requests, but are often also clients of other services. The...

A Perspective on SOA - Just Right Components

Wed, 05 Jan 2005 05:29:52 GMT

Web Services introduce a new unique granularity for dealing with software components. We have used software components of various forms for many years. The typical difference is the granularity of those components. Early software components were no more complex than software packaging in object filees(.o .obj) or shared-libraries (.so .dll) . Over time the granularity and complexity of components have grown as we have sought dynamic components and higher-level assembly of components....

A Perspective on SOA - Introduction

Wed, 05 Jan 2005 05:19:48 GMT

Today I followed that Don's blog has resprouted in new digs and read with interest his predictions. One prediction especially struck home when he wrote that "SOA will have been beaten to death and the software industry will invent or recycle some equally vague term to replace it." I agree...

Whiteboardability

Tue, 28 Sep 2004 17:55:38 GMT

The other day I saw some co-workers writing out some lengthy schema on a whiteboard to discuss a design. It was quite challenging to iterate the design on the whiteboard. Too bad whiteboards don't have drag/drop! This leads to a topic that I have discussed before. Schema is a fine formal way to share a type-system. However, are people truly effective at brainstorming and designing XML Schema? Perhaps there are a hard-core few. I tend to brainstorm models in something between UML...

Family Blog

Sat, 04 Sep 2004 05:48:10 GMT

I finally setup a blog for my wife, Sharon, it features her beautiful photography and touching writing. Hey, perhaps if I link to it here Google will find it! Writing: http://ericsons.net/ Photography: http://gallery.ericsons.net/

Watch Steve's blog

Wed, 25 Feb 2004 06:33:06 GMT

I'm really pleased to find Steve Vinoski's new blog Middleware Matters. It was a pleasure to work with him (along with a number of other brilliant middleware architects) on the infamous OMG COM/CORBA interop specification. I look forward to reading what I'm sure will be many insightful postings from Steve.

A Service is a Component

Tue, 24 Feb 2004 06:27:48 GMT

I like Clemen's definitions of Services vs. Components. Notice in Clemens definitions that Component and Service overlap in that they both are described as 'runtime' concepts. This supports my idea that a Service is a component but a component is not a service! Allow me to add to Clemens' 'component' definition to illustrate my...

XML Schema and MDA

Tue, 24 Feb 2004 05:06:29 GMT

Adam Blum responding to a Jon Udell blog entry suggested:

Also, it would be great to have software that let you "harvest" the types present in XML document schemas and WSDLs to encourage type reuse, or for better searching amidst a sea of interface definitions. The...