Signs on the Sand

Microsoft, BEA, IBM, Cisco, Intel , HP etc mix XML Schema, Schematron and XPointer to create a draft of

the Service Modeling Language (SML) used to model complex IT services and systems, including their structure, constraints, policies, and best practices.

A model in SML is realized as a set of interrelated XML documents. The XML documents contain information about the parts of an IT service, as well as the constraints that each part must satisfy for the IT service to function properly. Constraints are captured in two ways:
1. Schemas - these are constraints on the structure and content of the documents in a model. SML uses a profile of XML Schema 1.0 [2,3] as the schema language. SML also defines a set of extensions to XML Schema to support inter-document references.

2. Rules - are Boolean expressions that constrain the structure and content of documents in a model. SML uses a profile of Schematron [4,5,6] and XPath 1.0 [9] for rules.

Once a model is defined, one of the important operations on the model is to establish its validity. This involves checking whether all data in a model satisfies the schemas and rules declared.
This specification focuses primarily on defining the profile of XML Schema and Schematron used by SML, as well as the process of model validation.

Sort of XML Schema without some crappy features enhanced with Schemtron rules and XPointer based partial inclusions. Sounds cool not only in the domain of the service modeling. I wish I could use it for plain XML validation.

[Via Don Box]