STEP Tools News for Monday June 12

[Martin Hardwick]

This weekly newsletter is a brief update of what is going on in STEP
and at STEP Tools, Inc.  If you want to know more, try the STEP Tools
web site (http://www.steptools.com).


-------------------------------------------------
Containment Early Binding is now the SOAP Binding

Several different styles for representing STEP data in XML are being
investigated within the Part 28 committee.  Two of these styles are
being implemented by STEP Tools.

The Object Serialization Early Binding (OSEB):

    * Minimizes the size of an XML file.
    * Has a regular structure that is easy to write.

The SOAP binding (formerly the CEB):

    * Uses the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) conventions.
    * Has a nested structure that is easy to read.
    * Makes the AIM encoding of an ARM object easier to follow 
      and decipher.

SOAP and Biztalk are frameworks for communicating business messages
over the Internet. The recent troubles of Microsoft mean that SOAP is
likely to be the more successful because it is vendor neutral.

   http://search.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-box-http-soap-01.txt

Section 5 of the SOAP specification includes conventions for encoding
typical data structures such as structures, arrays, sparse arrays and
selects.  These SOAP conventions are highly compatible with those
originally adopted for the CEB, so we are updating the CEB to use
them, and will call the new specification the SOAP binding.

The SOAP binding is easy to read because XML processing systems such
as SAX and DOM have been optimised to process nested data.  It makes
STEP AIM data easier to understand by encapsulating the mapping from
the AIM representation of an item to its ARM within a series of nested
elements.


-------------
ST-Viewer 3.1

Version 3.1 of the ST-Viewer has been released and is available for
download on our web site. The new viewer features:

    * Edge picking.
    * OLE/COM interface that can be programmed using ST-Developer.
    * Many new surface types.
    * XML output to the SOAP format.

As a result of these upgrades the viewer can be used to view data
described by the wide range of Application Protocols and systems shown
on our home page. Existing ST-Viewer customers can upgrade to the new
version at no charge.

The XML output tool can be used with the viewer or a Part 21 editor
included with the Viewer. It will produce XML data for the selected
item or a DTD that describes all the data possibilities allowed by
STEP for that item. The tool quickly shows why the the XML/SOAP makes
the AIM encoding of STEP data easier to understand.

Using the XML tool, we have learnt more about how application data is
represented in STEP in three months than we learnt in the previous
five years.


-------------------
Translation Service

Summary:
Period Covered: Sun Jun  4 03:25:03 2000 -- Sun Jun 11 03:25:03 2000
Total usage: 63
Successful usage: 61 (97%)
Errors: 2 (3%)


Translator			total	errors	success rate

ACIS to STEP:		13	0	100%
STEP to ACIS:		22	2	90%
AP203 Checker:		1	0	100%
Parasolid to STEP:	8	0	100%
STEP to Parasolid:	5	0	100%
STEP to XML:		3	0	100%
Visualization tools:	6	0	100%
XML to STEP:		2	0	100%

=======================================
All-Time stats

------------------------------------
Summary:
Period Covered: Wed Dec 31 19:00:00 1969 -- Sun Jun 11 03:25:32 2000
Total usage: 9317
Successful usage: 8178 (87%)
Errors: 1139 (12%)


Translator			total	errors	success rate

ACIS to STEP:		2134	55	97%
STEP to ACIS:		3027	237	92%
STEP to XML:		87	18	79%
AP203 Checker:		623	48	92%
EXPRESS Checker:		11	1	90%
Parasolid to STEP:	318	119	62%
STEP to Parasolid:	400	116	71%
STEP to XML:		329	25	92%
Visualization tools:	440	116	73%
Visualization Service:	76	12	84%
XML to STEP:		86	21	75%


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