Map Force by Altova

Altova MapForce 2006 is the premier data mapping and Web services implementation tool with the power to integrate any combination of XML, database, text, and/or EDI files, and build Web services by mapping between WSDL operations.

Description

Today, the ability to seamlessly exchange information between internal business units, customers, and partners is vital for success; yet most organizations store and exchange information in a variety of dissimilar formats, such as EDI systems, flat files, databases, and XML-based applications. To efficiently leverage existing investments and interconnect business systems, organizations need the ability to map between these different data types and effectively convert their data in a standards-based, cost-effective manner.

Web services and custom data integration applications are two modern solutions that allow organizations to unify these disparate formats to enjoy the cost and competitive advantages of seamless information exchange. MapForce® 2006 uniquely lets you develop mappings between data formats in an intuitive, visual manner, then auto-generates the stylesheets or program code required to implement your Web services and custom data integration applications server-side.

The MapForce visual design paradigm means that you can create Web services and data integration applications - without having to write a line of code.

MapForce 2006 supports the following powerful functionality:

• Building Web services via a graphical interface.
• Mapping XML, database, flat file, and EDI source data to Web services operations.
• Auto-generating Java and C# program code to implement Web services.
• Mapping any combination of XML, database, flat file, and EDI data via a graphical interface.
• Integrating flat file data using MapForce FlexText, a graphical utility for parsing structured text files and incorporating legacy data in mapping designs.
• Auto-generating XSLT 1.0, XSLT 2.0, XQuery, Java, C++, or C# to implement data mappings (XSLT and XQuery for XML-to-XML mapping only).
• Executing, viewing, and saving output of data mapping transformations.
• Processing and filtering data with an extensive library of built-in and user-defined functions.
• Creating and saving complex data processing functions via the powerful visual function builder.
• Organizing and managing related mappings and Web services files in a handy project view, then generating code for an entire project.
• Accessing the MapForce user interface and functions in your own applications via OLE or ActiveX control.

Features

• XML Viewing and Validation
• XSL/XSLT Mapping
• XML/Database/Flat File/EDI Mapping
• Web Services support
• Programming-language support
• Code Generation
• Database and legacy support
• Connectivity
• User Interface
• Project Management
• Platforms
• International support

Benefits

Simplify Web Services Development

Web services are software components that allow disparate applications to exchange data using a standard XML-based messaging system. Since they are based on open Web standards and XML-based protocols, Web services are hardware, programming language, and operating system independent. This means that applications written in different programming languages and running on different platforms can seamlessly exchange data using Web services.

Despite the advantages of Web services for exchanging information between disparate systems, writing the code to implement them by hand can be complicated, time consuming, and error-prone. Altova MapForce 2006 removes this limitation by allowing you to build Web services visually, then auto-generating the Java or C# code required to implement the Web service on a server.

To build a Web service, you simply load an existing WSDL (Web Services Description Language) file in the MapForce project view, and create a mapping for each transaction. All standard WSDL documents are supported, including those created in the graphical WSDL design view of Altova XMLSpy.

Once you've loaded a WSDL file, you simply define the operations for each transaction included in the Web service as a mapping design. MapForce represents the transaction's input and output schemas graphically, and you can easily map data and perform operations by dragging connecting lines to link elements and dragging in function blocks from the library. Supported data sources include XML, databases, flat files, and EDI (EDIFACT and ASNI X12) formats, and you can map these in any combination to and from the operations in your WSDL transactions.

An extensible library of data processing functions is available for filtering and processing data before returning it to the output schema, and the MapForce visual function builder helps create and save complex functions for use in other mappings.

Once you've created mappings for the transactions in the WSDL file, you can generate code for a single transaction - or for the entire WSDL project - in Java or C#.

Now, instead of writing the hundreds to thousands of lines of code required to implement each Web services transaction, you can define mappings visually and let MapForce generate the code all at once. Code that used to take hours or days to write is now auto-generated in a matter of seconds. Visual design in MapForce removes the complexity from Web services development, allowing you to build standards-conformant Web services applications more quickly than ever before.

Integrate Enterprise Data

In addition to support for building Web services, MapForce 2006 allows you to design data integration applications for mapping any combination of XML, database, flat file, and EDI data.

XML mapping support is based on XML Schema:

• Database mapping support includes accessing database views and systems table in any relational database.
• Flat file mapping is supported through MapForce FlexText, a versatile utility for parsing structured text files.
• EDI mapping support includes the hundreds of messages covered by the two most popular EDI standards: UN/EDIFACT and ANSI X12.

You can map XML, databases, flat files, and EDI in any combination, and multiple sources and multiple targets are supported. As with Web services creation, you define mappings between content models visually by dragging connecting lines linking corresponding elements in the source(s) and target(s) and inserting data processing rules. You can choose functions from the extensive MapForce function library, import your own function libraries, and create and save complex functions using the unique visual function builder.

The built-in MapForce Engine allows you to execute any mapping and view the output with one click. The output of the MapForce Engine can be saved as the result of a one-time mapping, or it can be used for previewing sample results, which simplifies the process of designing and testing complex mapping projects significantly. Then, with just one more click, MapForce 2006 auto-generates the software code required to programmatically marshal data from the source(s) to the target(s) for use in customized server-side data integration applications. MapForce 2006 is the industry's first and only product to let you choose between XSLT 1.0, XSLT 2.0, XQuery, Java, C#, and C++ code-generation - all from the same mapping design.

With all this power and its exceptionally low price, MapForce compares very favorably against unwieldy, server-based enterprise application integration (EAI) and enterprise service bus (ESB) products, which may sell for ten or twenty times its price.

Utilize the Functionality You Need

MapForce 2006 is available in three editions customized for to meet your Web services and data integration needs:

• MapForce Standard Edition supports XML-to-XML mappings.
• MapForce Professional Edition supports XML, database, and flat file data mappings.
• MapForce Enterprise Edition supports all the features of MapForce Professional edition with the addition of Web services mapping and implementation, EDI mapping, and the FlexText flat file integration utility.

In addition, MapForce 2006 is now also available as an OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) or ActiveX control, which allows you to embed the MapForce user interface and access all its functionality in your own applications.