Microsoft Interoperability

CHALLENGES

Automation of administrative prozesses, integration of spezialised applications, achievement of interoperability with other administrations and companies and various system environments shall be made possible by using newest Microsoft-technologies and products. This evalution-project investigates to what extent Microsoft technologies and products do function smoothly with technologies and products from other vendors, including those from the open source sector. Is Interoperability convincingly demonstrated in terms of data exchange from documents of various Office programs, and of cross-technology collaboration on specialist procedures? The evaluation ist undertaken by the Vendor- and Technology-independant FOKUS eGovernment Lab.

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GOALS

The evaluation has two main aims: on the one hand to investigate whether and how data from Office documents could be transferred to various products from other vendors and successfully processed there. And on the other hand to clarify if and how data exchange between Office systems and various eGovernment platforms is possible. Both these issues are mission-critical for building seamless cross-agency eGovernment structures involving Office programs.

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FIRST-RESULTS

Data from Microsoft documents is fully compatible with transfer to, and further processing by, specialist procedures,
databases, workflow/process management systems, and other Office/OpenOffice documents. Transferability is based on Microsoft Office 2003’s support for open standards – in this case XML technologies. Data from MS Office documents is easy to implement and deploy in distributed business processes – a simple form can be implemented in just a few hours. Ease of implementation is due to Office 2003’s built-in support for XML technologies which, for instance, enables it to identify the structure of scanned-in XML documents and thus significantly reduce integration outlay. In terms of application interoperability, specialist applications from the Microsoft Solutions Platform E-Government Starter Kit 2.0 (.Net/Biztalk2004) can interoperate with specialist applications stemming from other platforms. Interoperability is based on support for open standard technologies – in this case WebService technologies – which can interact with systems of other vendors like the ORACLE BPEL Process Manager.

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EXECUTIVE-SUMMARY

From a technology standpoint, development of open standards has made such huge advances that nothing now stands in the way of building seamless infrastructures for processes of eGovernment. Products supporting open standards (i.e. XML, WebServices) drive forward cooperation between various administrative agencies and backend and frontend systems, and enable deployment of the familiar Office working environment.

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TECHNOLOGY

Standards and Technologies under Test

Document Interoperability Standards deployed (W3C)

• XML, XSD, XSLT, SOAP, WSDL

Technologies deployed

• Open Office Writer

• Microsoft Office 2003 Word Professional

• Microsoft Solutions Platform E-Government Starter Kit 2.0 (.NET, Biztalk2004)

• Oracle BPEL Process Manager (J2EE)

Application Interoperability Standards deployed (W3C)

• XML, XSD, XSLT, SOAP, WSDL

• Business Process Execution Language (BPEL) (OASIS)

• WebService Interoperability Recommendations (WS-I)

• Standards and Architectures for eGovernment (SAGA 2.0)

Technologies deployed

• Microsoft solutions platform E-Government Starter Kit 2.0 (.NET, Biztalk2004)

• Oracle BPEL Process Manager (J2EE)

• Specialized Procedure: Civil Status Registry (AutiSta)

• Specialized Procedure: Registration of Domicile (MESO)

• Basic Services: Form Server (Lucom)

• Web Browser

• Form Service

• MS Office 2003 Word Professional,

• OpenOffice Writer
  

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PARTNERS

Fraunhofer FOKUS eGovernment Lab

Microsoft Deutschland GmbH