XML Uses
A few weeks ago I was attending the quarterly webmasters meeting at BYU. There was a discussion about getting a group of people from across campus together to form an XML advisory group of sorts. I wasn’t exactly sure what the focus or purpose of the group was, but it sounded interesting so I raised my hand along with several others when they asked who would be interested in participating in such a group. The next question was, who would like to be the head of the group? I wasn’t about to volunteer for that, so I sat silently…much like everyone else who raised their hand to the previous question. After a few moments of awkward silence someone volunteered that Jeff (me) should probably head the group since I also serve on the university web advisory board. That’s when I knew I was in trouble, a few seconds later it was all over and I was the head of the group.
I was a little nervous about this decision for a few reasons. For one thing I’m short staffed right now and my workload has been backed up for months and I wasn’t sure I would have enough time to devote to the group (I’m still not). Second, I didn’t have a clear idea of what the purpose of the group was. All I knew was it had something to do with the use of XML across campus.
After asking around a bit I discovered the idea behind the group was to look at designing some XML standards for campus to share news releases and other information which could be valuable as a shared resource. After some discussion on the group email list I believe the best way to go is to look at implementing widely adopted XML standards already in use, as opposed to creating our own. RSS or ATOM could be used for press releases. I’ve started thinking about other ways we could use XML. Sharing calendar information for example. I’m not sure if there is already a calendar XML standard, but it’s worth looking into. Anyway, it looks like my hobby interest in XML might have to grow a little. If anyone is aware of good XML resources or has some good ideas about how it could be used on campus, let me know.
April 11th, 2005 at 12:32 pm
I apologize for this comment being not at all computer-related, let alone XML-related. However, I must ask: Where are the pictures of the fiance? Those who are stil a little dubious that a girl agreed to marry you might like to see some photographic evidence of said girl and of her wearing the alleged ring.