Cataloging for Electronic Commerce:

Tool and Resource Development for

Creating Standardized Catalogs

forU.S. Defense Logistics Information

Service

Barry Frye, Senior Technical Staff MemberSupply Chain Support

October 12, 2005

Agenda

• Project Contributors

• Cataloging Challenges

• Technical Data Integration and Catalog Enhancement I (TDICE I)

• TDICE II– Implementation Guide (IG)– Application Enhancements

• Conclusion

Project Contributors

• Funded by the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) for the U.S. Defense Logistics Information Service (DLIS)

• TDICE I and II applications developed by Concurrent Technologies Corporation (CTC)

• Supported by the Electronic Commerce Code Management Association (ECCMA) and Lehigh University

Cataloging Challenges

• Buyers contend with a wide variety of catalogs: – format, language, measurement standards, and

level of detail

• Catalogs are either exclusively computer-readable or human-readable

• Sellers develop and maintain several catalogs to address various market segments and distribution channels

TDICE I

• Developed standard Extensible Markup Language (XML) formats for Catalogs

• Interfaced with ECCMA Open Technical Dictionary (eOTD):

– Uses Standard Item Names and Attribute Names

• Developed open-source tools to encourage customization and comment

TDICE I Tools

• Catalog Builder– Interactively add/change Item descriptions

• Catalog Translator/Viewer– View Catalog in chosen language and at level of

detail

• Query Builder– Develop queries to locate items in several Catalogs

• Query Processor– Process queries and view results

TDICE II

• Uses (XML-based) Implementation Guides (IG) that specify Buyer requirements of Catalog content

• Enables development of large catalogs

• Enables use of legacy Item data sources

−(Microsoft® Access and Excel, text files)

• Enables use of an external Item Repository of Catalog validation

TDICE II Overview

Implementation Guide

• Represents buyer-specific requirements– Customized Catalog templates based on buyer

needs

• Utilizes standard XML-based representation– Enables computer-processing

• Certified by ECCMA

Sample Implementation Guide

Catalog Builder Overview

• Enables interactive item description using Implementation Guide specifications

• Validates the Catalog as it is being built

• Enables mapping legacy data to item descriptions in the Catalog

• Interfaces with:– eOTD using Web services– an external Item Repository for Catalog certification

Catalog Builder – Item Creation

Catalog Builder – Data Mapping

Catalog XML

Query Builder

Query Processor

Catalog Translator

Summary

Conclusion

• Developed:– Standard Catalog and Implementation Guide XML

formats

– Processes for certification and maintenance of Catalogs and Implementation Guides

– Interfaces for the use of standard identifiers from the eOTD

– Tools for building large standard Catalogs from legacy data

– Tools for viewing and querying standard Catalogs.

TDICE II Catalog Tools will be available in February 2006 via the ECCMA Web site www.eccma.org