Neat Apps 28 Jul 2006 02:57 pm
The Amazing XML Crunching Machine
It’s not very often that an enterprise product is associated with the word “amazing”, but this one is an exception. Of course I’m talking about the XML routers from Solace systems.
To use the router, an user would upload XPath subscriptions via a Java API. Whenever an XML document is published to the router, it would be routed to the subscribers with a matching XPath. At the heart of the router is a custom ASIC chip that could read XML documents and perform XPath matches in near realtime. Think of it as “hardware accelerated” XML parsing, but that’s not all. If you take a few of these routers and make them visible to each other, they will automatically exchange their subscription data, so the routers become a single entity from the user’s perspective, making it extremely efficient for data multi-casting.
This is exciting news for LiveCycle Workflow because we can now offload certain segments of the workflow into this XML crunching machine. These routers could also be used to load balance multiple Workflow servers or provide a bridging service between Workflow and other enterprise products. The possibilities are endless.
I think this is going to be a very disruptive technology as the demand for high performance XML routing increase in the enterprise space. Cisco has developed a similar product known as the AON and IBM was very quick to integrate WebSphere with AON. It would be wise for Adobe to reach out to Solace or Cisco and make sure LiveCycle works well with their XML routers.
Need to bring your Flex project up to speed? Zee Yang is a freelance Flex developer with deep understanding of architecture and user experience. You can reach him at zee.yang@gmail.com.
