Are you OPEN?
I wrote a little ditty that explains the value of what FEMA’s Integrated Public Alert and Warning System offers to vendors, open source developers, and even contract developers, in the Emergency Management and Public Warning Domains. It is a question that users of such software might ask their vendors.
Can you connect using standards?
Are you open to all?
Or are you a silo?
Using “standards” to stall?
Our open web service [1]
Connects all kinds of apps.
A middleware instance
To share more than “CAPs.”[2]
We have a web service
Based on EDXL [3]
That helps apps connect
Yet encapsulate well.
Hard wired integration
Is not what we do.
You connect via service
As captured by you.
You decide layout
And your design form
But connect to all others
Using standards as norm.
We make it straightforward.
Your connection is clean.
The boundaries work well.
You control what is seen.
You have the power.
We provide pipes,
For transferring data
Of all defined types.
With data described
Using DE [4]
So intelligent routing
Can come to be.
We provide access.
You set the rules
In the tags that you set
In the DE through your tools.
We then connect others
As desired by you.
And they get your data
As you want them to.
They can format the layout
In their own way.
Connected, yet separate
With their own say
Into how to display
And how to reuse
And so can all others
Unless you refuse.
You can work independent,
Yet use standards to share.
The best choice to ensure
Service to all; everywhere.
Gary A. Ham – May 14, 2009
[1] FEMA – IPAWS-OPEN
[2] OASIS Common Alerting Protocol
[3] OASIS Emergency Data Exchange Language
[4] OASIS EDXL Distribution Element
