RE: XML - where's the beef?

["SM Rush" <sellar -at- apptechsys -dot- com>]

My company has been working with something that looks like XML for over 15
years.  It's a database engine that basically uses a hierarchical structure
(not relational) to organize data and then performs some operations
(inversion) that creates a network of connections among data in the
database.  When XML came out a few years ago we said gee that looks
familiar.  It looks something like this:

Movie Title:Star Wars
   Release Date:1977
     Director:Lucas, George
     Genre:Science Fiction
     Genre:Adventure
     Role:Han Solo
        Actor:Ford, Harrison
     Role:Princess Leia
        Actro:Fisher, Carrie
.....

The structure's incredibly flexible, and the data network reveals some very
interesting relationships.

The connection between a hierarchical structure such as XML and semantic
nets is one we've been working with for years.  One of our primary
applications is a conceptual analysis tool that can identify conceptual
relationships among words and documents.  For example:  in a database on
terrorist activity, the application recognizes that there's a relationship
(not necessarily synonymous) between the words terrorist, rebel, criminal,
guerrilla, troops, army, etc.  One of the neat things it can do is to take
one document and find all other documents in the database that have a
significant level of similarity (based on concepts, not just key words).
Another neat feature called "gist", creates abstracts of each document by
identifying the conceptually "significant" words in the document. Right now
we're working on an application that will map a collection of documents,
automatically creating information groupings based on content.  Needless to
say, the conceptual analysis is most effective when the subject matter is
limited to a specific topic, such as law, medicine, nuclear power, law
enforcement.

XML, or to put it more accurately, the theories behind XML have a tremendous
potential, in communication as well as in other areas (neural nets,
anyone?).

I think that one of the ramifications of our product and others including
XML is an increased reliance on information.  Right now, while there's lots
of data out there, people are still severely limited in the ways they can
use it.  This problem came about partly because technologically our ability
to store and process data developed much faster than our ability to analyze
it effectively.  But people jumps on the data collection bandwagon anyway
without looking ahead.  Now that we're starting to catch up on the analysis
side, all the the dreams that people had five years ago about using
information will start to bear fruit.  And technical writers will be needed
to help feed the increasing demand for good, useful information.

Sella Rush
Applied Technical Systems
Developers of CCM Knowledge Discovery
www.apptechsys.com


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