STEP Modules Repository Demo

1
STEP Modules Repository Demo

• Josh Lubell
• NIST Manufacturing Systems Integration Division
• International Workshop on Aerospace Product Data
  Exchange
• Gaithersburg, MD
• April 9, 2003

2
Rationale

• Reduce the high cost and lengthy time to develop
  STEP standards
• Allow implementation of a combination of multiple
  specifications or extension of implementations
  with additional capabilities
• Enable application software reuse
• Eliminate duplication and repeated documentation
  of the same requirements in difference
  specifications
• Improve interoperability between STEP standards

3
Who is doing what?

• PDES, Inc.
• Requirements, content
• NIST (Josh Lubell, Simon Frechette, Allison
  Barnard Feeney)
• Technical leadership, physical organization,
  access framework
• Eurostep (contractor to NIST)
• Authoring tools
• Transformation to human-readable formats

4
Repository users

• Standards developers
• Repository reduces standards development costs
  though eliminating unnecessary repetition and
  better reuse of common resources
• This will lead to improved interoperability
• Implementors
• Repository will make it easier to build
  implementations containing multiple subsets or
  extensions

5
Technical approach

• Represent STEP modules (mini-standards) using XML
• Captures both natural language and
  computer-interpretable aspects of STEP
• XML is non-proprietary, blessed by standards
  bodies and open source developers, etc., etc.
• Use sourceforge.net for development environment
• Facilitates collaboration between
  organizationally and geographically diverse
  developers
• Provides CVS (Concurrent Versioning System) for
  tracking revisions, managing updates
• We're basically tackling STEP standards
  development as if it were a large software
  project

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Multiple presentations of XML STEP modules
Input tosoftware tools(e.g. EXPRESS)
lt?xml version1.0?gt...
Publishedstandards
Hyperlinkedweb pages
ISO blah blahblah blah
7
Screen shot
8
Developer requirements

• A local, up-to-date version of the module
  repository
• Software requirements
• Ant
• Build tool for Java
• Great for managing XML processing tasks
• Java (needed for Ant)
• CVS client
• XML tools
• XML editor (your choice)
• SAXON XSLT processor
• Windows, IE6
• Navigation features use XSLT extensions not yet
  supported by Netscape/Mozilla
• Some productivity tools written in Microsoft
  JScript
• SSH client (developer access to Sourceforge CVS)
• To view an HTML build, all you need is a
  not-too-out-of-date web browser (IE 5, Netscape
  6)

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Making a new module

• Create the directory
• Update the repository index
• Create EXPRESS, and mark up in XML
• In any order, add
• Descriptions for EXPRESS entities and attributes
• Scope
• Mapping specification
• EXPRESS-G
• Other miscellaneous items
• Generate HTML

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How is this better than the old way?

• Files, directory structure automatically created
• Built-in quality assurance
• Cross checks
• Formatting automatic
• Boilerplate automatically inserted
• Multiple views from same XML data
• ISO
• Developer
• Summary

11
Demo!
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Benefits

• Presentation in multiple formats
• ISO
• Developer
• Summary
• Ease in navigation and searching
• Improved authoring and quality control
• Infrastructure for secure and traceable
  collaborative development

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Areas for improvement

• Better integration of utility scripts
• Better platform independence
• Some scripts require Windows
• Updates too slow
• Mostly due to shortcomings of CVS
• Better versioning systems are on the horizon
• More configuration management needed
• Multiple projects, but nobody is managing the
  project managers

14
Plans for the future

• Improve updates process
• Add capability to Ant build files to update
  designated subsets of modules
• Investigate Subversion, a replacement for CVS
• Finish implementing DTD and stylesheets for
  modular APs
• Modularize AP203

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For more information

• Visit the home page
• http//stepmod.sourceforge.net
• Or contact me
• lubell_at_nist.gov