From: Sebastian Hammer <quinn@indexdata.com>
Date: Tue, 10 Apr 2007 15:44:33 +0000 (+0000)
Subject: Added description of connections to non-standard resources
X-Git-Tag: PAZPAR2.1.0.0~340
X-Git-Url: http://git.indexdata.com/?p=pazpar2-moved-to-github.git;a=commitdiff_plain;h=22ac8c879e787936d11e5a6190b66e89b1a7acfb

Added description of connections to non-standard resources
---

diff --git a/doc/book.xml b/doc/book.xml
index 94f3458..fff249a 100644
--- a/doc/book.xml
+++ b/doc/book.xml
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@
      <!ENTITY % common SYSTEM "common/common.ent">
      %common;
 ]>
-<!-- $Id: book.xml,v 1.10 2007-04-10 15:12:51 quinn Exp $ -->
+<!-- $Id: book.xml,v 1.11 2007-04-10 15:44:33 quinn Exp $ -->
 <book id="book">
  <bookinfo>
   <title>Pazpar2 - User's Guide and Reference</title>
@@ -336,7 +336,7 @@
     </section>
 
     <section id="client">
-      <title>Client development</title>
+      <title>Client development overview</title>
       <para>
         You can use pazpar2 from any environment that allows you to use
 	webservices. The initial goal of the software was to support
@@ -371,7 +371,9 @@
 	to handle a broad range of different server behavior, through
 	configurable query mapping and record normalization. If you develop
 	configuration, stylesheets, etc., for a new type of resources, we
-	encourage you to share your work.
+	encourage you to share your work. But you can also use pazpar2 to
+	connect to hundreds of resources that do not support standard
+	protocols.
       </para>
 
       <para>
@@ -384,13 +386,49 @@
 
       <para>
         But what about resources that don't support Z39.50 at all? The NISO
-	SRU protocol is slowly gathering steam. Other resources might
+	SRU (MXG) protocol is slowly gathering steam. Other resources might
 	support OpenSearch, private, XML/HTTP-based protocols, or something
 	else entirely. Some databases exist only as web user interfaces and
 	  will require screen-scraping. Still others exist only as static
 	  files, or perhaps as databases supporting the OAI-PMH protocol.
 	  There is hope! Read on.
       </para>
+
+      <para>
+        Index Data continues to advocate the support of open standards. We
+	work with database vendors to support standards, so you don't have
+	to worry about programming against non-standard services. We also
+	provide tools (see <ulink
+	url="http://www.indexdata.com/simpleserver">SimpleServer</ulink>)
+	which make it comparatively easy to build gateways against servers
+	with non-standard behavior. Again, we encourage you to share any
+	work you do in this direction.
+      </para>
+
+      <para>
+        But the bottom line is that working with non-standard resources in
+	metasearching is really, really hard. If you want to build a
+	project with pazpar2, and you need access to resources with
+	non-standard interfaces, we can help. We run gateways to more than
+	2,000 popular, commercial databases and other resources, making it simple
+	to plug them directly into pazpar2. For a small annual fee per
+	database, we can help you establish connections to your licensed
+	resources. Meanwhile, you can help! If you build your own
+	standards-compliant gateways, host them for others, or share the
+	code! And tell your vendors that they can save everybody money and
+	increase the appeal of their resources by supporting standards.
+      </para>
+
+      <para>
+        There are those who will ask us why we are using Z39.50 as our
+	switchboard langyage rather than a different protocol. Basically,
+	we believe that Z39.50 is presently the most widely implemented 
+	information retrieval protocol that has the level of functionality
+	required to support a good metasearching experience (structured
+	searching, structured, well-defined results). It is also compact and
+	efficient, and there is a very broad range of tools available to
+	implement it.
+      </para>
     </section>
   </chapter> <!-- Using pazpar2 -->