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Data Exchange Specifications - Business overview
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The ISO standard 10303-239:2005 (PLCS - Product Life Cycle Support) specifies an information model that defines what information can be exchanged and represented to support a product through life. Examples of such information are,
The fact that PLCS is an ISO standard ensures stability and global interoperability.
In order to make the PLCS information model suited for many different business contexts, and appropriate for future contexts, it is deliberately generic. The model can therefore be made more precise with business specific terms. The model term 'identifier' can be classified as e.g. 'product number', if this is the term used by the sending or receiving organisation. This technique is referred to as "Reference Data".
Although the model is generic, it is still quite large. In order to support existing data exchange needs, the DEX Specifications has been created. The needs were identified during the initial activity modelling session when the standard was created, and each one is technically detailed in the DEX Specifications. Examples of information that needs to be exchanged are product structures, maintenance plans and work requests.
Capabilities are building blocks from which a DEX specification is constructed. They are used to accelerate DEX development and to avoid different interpretations of equivalent concepts in different DEX Specifications. Capabilities ensure a common interpretation of PLCS, avoid multiple dialects of PLCS, and reduce the amount of documentation in these information pages.
These main concepts are all further explained in the Technical description section.
The information model defined by ISO 10303-239 (PLCS) has a scope that is wider than most applications or any single data exchange. So it is unlikely that any piece of software will be able to declare compliance to PLCS as PLCS covers more than the software can handle. It is also going to be difficult to contract for data to be provided according to ISO 10303-239 as the scope is so large.
Reason for restricting the scope of the information model...
The DEX Specifications (Data EXchange Specifications) aim to address this problem by providing a way of narrowing down the scope of the information model to be used in any given exchange.
A data package conforming to a DEX Specification is known as a DEX file.
Benefits of applying PLCS DEX specifications to your data exchange... (look at the Business concept section for example text...)
The path-xxx must be reset.
How a DEX specification can act as an Exchange Contract... (Detailed description in the Tech section)
(principles for selecting and implementing) How and when to create a new DEX specification; - refining an existing one - defining a new DEX specification (company, domain, language, etc)
The PLCS standard was developed by the PLCS Inc. consortium under the supervision of ISO TC184-SC4. Further information on this Technical Committee and their other areas of work can be found at their web site (http://www.tc184-sc4.org/). The PLCS Inc. group consisted of manufacturing industry, government agencies and software delopers from Finland, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom. The work on the DEX Specification and other areas concerning the application of PLCS is carried out under the flag of the OASIS PLCS TC.