Why SharePoint Scares Me
For the past four years or so, at two different organizations, I’ve been evaluating Microsoft’s Sharepoint 2007 as a Portal/Intranet/Business Process Management solution. It’s a hard thing to ignore, for numerous reasons:
open APIs
XML, API, CSV, SOAP! Understanding The Alphabet Soup Of Data Exchange
This article was originally published at Idealware in October of 2007. Let’s say you have two different software packages, and you’d like them to be able to share data. What would be involved? Can you link them so they exchange data automatically? And what do all those acronyms mean? Peter Campbell explains. There has been a lot of talk lately about data integration, Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), and how important these are to non-profits. Much of this talk has focused on the major non-profit software packages from companies like Blackbaud, Salesforce.com, Convio, and Kintera. But what is it really about, and what does it mean… Read More »XML, API, CSV, SOAP! Understanding The Alphabet Soup Of Data Exchange
How To Find Data-Exchange-Friendly Software
This article was co-written by Laura Quinn of Idealware and first published on the NTEN Blog in October of 2007. Peter Campbell, Techcafeteria, and Laura Quinn, Idealware This is an excerpt adapted from Idealware’s article, “XML, API, CSV, SOAP! Understanding the Alphabet Soup of Data Exchange“. Repeat this mantra: I will not pay a vendor to lock me out of my own data. Sadly, this is what a lot of data management systems do, either by maintaining poor reporting and exporting interfaces or by including license clauses that void the contract if you interact with your data in unapproved ways. The software you choose has… Read More »How To Find Data-Exchange-Friendly Software
Instant Open API with Rails 2.0
Day 2 at the Ruby on Rails conference – after the Keynote. My main focus is on technology trends that allow us all to make better use of the vast amounts of information that we store in myriad locations and formats across diverse systems. The new standards for database manipulation (SQL); data interchange (XML) and data delivery (RSS) are huge developments in an industry that has traditionally offered hundreds different ways of managing, exporting and delivering data, none of which worked particularly well — if at all — with anybody else’s method. The technology industry has tried to address this with one size fits all… Read More »Instant Open API with Rails 2.0
Seven Questions For Peter Campbell On Open APIs
This interview was conducted by Holly Ross and first published on the NTEN Blog in July of 2006. What’s an Application Programming Interface (API)? APIs are the code in any application that allows for the customization and migration of information in and out of the program’s data store.The API allows your application to interface with other systems in the same manner that a door or data line allows your home to interact with the world around it. APIs were originally developed in the telecom industry, as the need to have computer applications that integrated with telephone systems arose.The concept quickly expanded as a method for… Read More »Seven Questions For Peter Campbell On Open APIs