Seems we have fast food chains that have been around forever. At least it seems that way to me in the fifty years I have been on this planet. I grew up with McDonalds, Burger King, Taco Bell, Wendy’s, to name a few. With so many one time successful store chains that have made grand appearances just to disappear, it is amazing how these organizations have survived the ups and downs of our economy.
I just saw an advertisement from McDonalds on my way home from the office. Seriously, how many times can you re-invent and re-brand a quarter pounder? But……it is re-introduced - bigger, better, all improved, etc; and market share continues to support the company’s growth in this economy.
So if I applied these same principles to the world of EDI and XML, I think we see the re-inventing and re-branding also occurring. Back 15 years ago when CXML made its appearance full speed ahead, there was chatter EDI was to become a code of the past. CXML was popular for some time as those shook their heads yes to believing CXML was the solution. Admittedly, I was one who shook my head too. But after a few years that changed for me and many in my network. Come to discover, CXML brought the same challenges as EDI brought. Fields could be used loosely to populate data for transactions. The definition of the field could easily be lost in translation. Message sections were popular. Some of those very same challenges we faced with EDI were now being faced with the code that was going to fix everything.
But EDI and XML have survived, and the world of “E” continues to grow. I believe the industry is adapting to what is acceptable and not acceptable (improvement!) when deploying bigger and better. And if we think about re-branding, we now have XML for music, geography, astronomy, education, health care, etc. etc. etc.
So in ending…..introducing the new improved quarter pounder! Did you know they have an XML for that! Yes, mpXML….XML for the meat industry. What’s next?