Page 56 - GAO-02-327 Electronic Government: Challenges to Effective Adoption of the Extensible Markup Language
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Chapter 3: The Federal Government Faces
Challenges in Realizing XML’s Full Potential
agencies to use voluntary consensus standards in lieu of government-
unique standards, except where inconsistent with law or otherwise
impractical. The guidelines also address agency participation in voluntary
consensus standards bodies and describe procedures for satisfying the
reporting requirements of the National Technology Transfer and
Advancement Act of 1995 (Public Law 104-113).
In the case of EDI, the federal government presented a “single face to
industry” by chartering a Federal EDI Standards Management
Coordinating Committee. The committee’s objectives were to (1) adopt
governmentwide EDI standards for implementation, (2) coordinate federal
agency participation in EDI standards bodies to ensure adequate
consideration of the government’s business needs and to ensure
consistency of position (thus presenting a “single face” to industry), and
(3) share EDI information among agencies regarding current or planned
implementations to avoid duplicate efforts and to streamline the process. 5
As a result of the committee’s work, a number of larger federal agencies
are now successfully using EDI to conduct electronic business with
established business partners.
XML Interoperability Systems developers in the federal government would benefit from the
establishment of an XML registry, which they could consult to identify and
across the obtain predefined data elements and structures that are already in use. The
Government Depends XML Working Group is in the process of building a pilot version of such a
registry. However, the registry will be effective in supporting systems
on an Effective Cross- interoperability among federal agencies only if governmentwide polices
Agency Registry are set, guidelines established, and a defined management and funding
process put in place for operating the registry.
In contrast to the “top down” approach of defining and mandating the use
of specific data structures or vocabularies, a “bottom up” approach is to
establish a centralized registry of XML components—including data
elements, DTDs, and schemas—and coordinate its use by XML systems
developers. Under this arrangement, XML developers would be
encouraged to submit data elements and structures used in their systems
for inclusion in the registry. Other developers would then be able to look
up these structures in the registry and incorporate them, as appropriate,
into their own systems. Developers would have the incentive to reuse data
5
This process is described in FIPS Publication 161-2, Electronic Data Interchange (EDI).
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