News

Oracle, Siemens Team Up on E-Business Directory Standard

• By Scott Bekker
• 11/02/1999

The directories will serve as corporate "white pages" for basic information on people, locations and IT resources across a network. The Oracle/Siemens meta directory solution will help corporations save money and improve information access by coordinating and synchronizing resources in a centralized Web-based environment, the companies say.

The Oracle/Siemens meta directory solution will be based on Siemens' DirXmetahub meta directory technology and the Oracle Internet Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) directory service.

The solution will allow large companies to rely on a single repository to coordinate and synchronize information from different parts of their organization in a Web-based environment.

The meta directory solution will use an open approach to integrate a company's installed base of LDAP directories and make information accessible via the Web.

Meta directories enhance the way large businesses implement communications in cross-company networks by combining and synchronizing enterprise resource systems, database applications, messaging systems and network operating systems into a single repository that can be managed and updated from a single access point with single sign-on and passwords.

The new Oracle/Siemens meta directory solution will provide interoperability between Oracle Internet Platform products, e-business applications, and other directory products such as Novell Directory Services and Microsoft Active Directory. The new meta directory solution will also take advantage of the work of the Directory Services Markup Language (DSML) standards consortium of which Oracle is a co-founder. The proposed DSML standards will give XML-ready applications and directories the ability to interoperate using XML.

The two companies are planning to demonstrate their integrated products at Oracle OpenWorld '99 in Los Angeles later this month.