<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<html xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml" xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" xmlns:st1="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40">
<head>
<meta name=Generator content="Microsoft Word 11 (filtered medium)">
<!--[if !mso]>
<style>
v\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);}
o\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);}
w\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);}
.shape {behavior:url(#default#VML);}
</style>
<![endif]--><o:SmartTagType
namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="Street"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="PostalCode"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="City"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="State"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="address"/>
<!--[if !mso]>
<style>
st1\:*{behavior:url(#default#ieooui) }
</style>
<![endif]-->
<style>
<!--
/* Font Definitions */
@font-face
{font-family:Tahoma;
panose-1:2 11 6 4 3 5 4 4 2 4;}
/* Style Definitions */
p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{margin:0in;
margin-bottom:.0001pt;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";}
a:link, span.MsoHyperlink
{color:blue;
text-decoration:underline;}
a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed
{color:purple;
text-decoration:underline;}
p
{mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
margin-right:0in;
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;
margin-left:0in;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";}
span.EmailStyle17
{mso-style-type:personal;
font-family:Arial;
color:windowtext;}
span.EmailStyle18
{mso-style-type:personal-reply;
font-family:Arial;
color:navy;}
@page Section1
{size:8.5in 11.0in;
margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;}
div.Section1
{page:Section1;}
-->
</style>
</head>
<body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple>
<div class=Section1>
<p class=MsoNormal><a name=""><font size=2 color=navy face=Arial><span
style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Arial;color:navy'>Every major vendor of
enterprise software has at least one, and likely ½ dozen tools that deal
with binary/text file formats. The goal of DFDL is to reduce the redundant
effort in creating and maintaining these tools, and to encourage cross-vendor
compatibility with these format specifications, which are quite hard to create
and to debug/maintain. <o:p></o:p></span></font></a></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 color=navy face=Arial><span style='font-size:
10.0pt;font-family:Arial;color:navy'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 color=navy face=Arial><span style='font-size:
10.0pt;font-family:Arial;color:navy'>BEA is particularly big on “converting”
binary data to XML, which to me mostly makes sense logically, but physically is
awfully inefficient. <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 color=navy face=Arial><span style='font-size:
10.0pt;font-family:Arial;color:navy'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 color=navy face=Arial><span style='font-size:
10.0pt;font-family:Arial;color:navy'>…mike<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<div>
<p><b><font size=2 color=navy face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial;color:navy;font-weight:bold'>Mike Beckerle | OGF DFDL WG
Co-Chair | CTO | Oco, Inc.</span></font></b><font color=navy><span
style='color:navy'><br>
</span></font><font size=2 color=gray face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial;color:gray'>Tel: 781-810-2100 | <u1:address u2:st="on"><u1:Street u2:st="on"><st1:address
w:st="on"><st1:Street w:st="on">504 Totten Pond Road</u1:Street></st1:Street>, <u1:City u2:st="on"><st1:City
w:st="on">Waltham</u1:City></st1:City> <u1:State u2:st="on"><st1:State w:st="on">MA</u1:State></st1:State>
<u1:PostalCode u2:st="on"><st1:PostalCode w:st="on">02451</u1:PostalCode></u1:address></st1:PostalCode></st1:address>
|</span></font><font color=navy><span style='color:navy'> <a
href="mailto:mbeckerle.dfdl@gmail.com"><font size=2 color=gray><span
style='font-size:10.0pt;color:gray'>mbeckerle.dfdl@gmail.com</span></font></a></span></font><font
size=2 color=gray face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Arial;
color:gray'> </span></font><o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
<div>
<div class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><font size=3
face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:12.0pt'>
<hr size=3 width="100%" align=center tabindex=-1>
</span></font></div>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><font size=2 face=Tahoma><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Tahoma;font-weight:bold'>From:</span></font></b><font size=2
face=Tahoma><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Tahoma'> dfdl-wg-bounces@ogf.org
[mailto:dfdl-wg-bounces@ogf.org] <b><span style='font-weight:bold'>On Behalf Of
</span></b>RPost<br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>Sent:</span></b> Wednesday, July 09, 2008
8:18 PM<br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>To:</span></b> dfdl-wg@ogf.org<br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>Subject:</span></b> [DFDL-WG] Info on BEAs
Format Builder - Java GUI to convert binaryto/from XML</span></font><o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>Hi,<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>Open mouth – insert foot. At my current contract site
I happened to mention to some people that BEA has a Format Builder app that can
convert binary to/from XML. Seems they had a team of people halfway through a
project writing custom Java code to read Mainframe files (mostly copybook) and
load the data into Oracle but hadn’t known that the BEA Integration suite
they had been using for years already had that functionality.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>Reminds me of my favorite definition: Contractor –
someone who borrows your watch to tell you what time it is.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>I had assumed you all were aware of BEAs Format Builder but
figured I would pass the info on anyway.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>1. From the BEA docs page: <a href="http://e-docs.bea.com/"
title="blocked::http://e-docs.bea.com/">http://e-docs.bea.com/</a><o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>2. Select BEA WebLogic Integration under the BEA WebLogic
section (<a href="http://e-docs.bea.com/wli/docs102/index.html"
title="blocked::http://e-docs.bea.com/wli/docs102/index.html">http://e-docs.bea.com/wli/docs102/index.html</a>)<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>3. Select ‘Using Format Builder’ under the Data
Transformation section (<a
href="http://e-docs.bea.com/wli/docs102/fbhelp/index.html"
title="blocked::http://e-docs.bea.com/wli/docs102/fbhelp/index.html">http://e-docs.bea.com/wli/docs102/fbhelp/index.html</a>).<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'> You can select ‘view as PDF’
to save a local copy.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>There is also a tutorial on creating a WebLogic Integration
Process to extract mainframe data (cobol copybook) and inserting<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>the data into an Oracle database: <a
href="http://www.dev2dev.co.kr/pub/a/2004/06/Bukhari_WLIProcess.jsp"
title="blocked::http://www.dev2dev.co.kr/pub/a/2004/06/Bukhari_WLIProcess.jsp">http://www.dev2dev.co.kr/pub/a/2004/06/Bukhari_WLIProcess.jsp</a><o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>If you download the author’s files (<a
href="http://ftpna2.bea.com/pub/downloads/WLIProcess_Bukhari.zip"
title="blocked::http://ftpna2.bea.com/pub/downloads/WLIProcess_Bukhari.zip">http://ftpna2.bea.com/pub/downloads/WLIProcess_Bukhari.zip</a>)
the zip file will have<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>the copybook format (employee.cpy) and the BEA MFL (message
format language) file (Employee.mfl) which shows<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>how the cobol format was mapped to the schema file.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>The zip also contains various *.java files that show the
bean files that were created.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>The ‘Mainframe Data Extraction’ doc in the zip
file contains the tutorial text and diagrams as a Word document.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>The Format Builder GUI lets you build the XML tree
graphically and can launch a test GUI that lets you test the conversion in both
directions.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>The BEA Integration Suite is available for free evaluation
(as is all of Oracle’s products) on the Oracle edelivery site at <a
href="http://edelivery.oracle.com/">http://edelivery.oracle.com/</a> if anyone
is interested in trying the tool.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>I can also email some screenshots if there is any interest. <o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'>Rick<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:Arial'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
</div>
</body>
</html>