ICE

The ICE specification, originally developed in 1998 by a community of 80 content providers and software venders, provides businesses with an XML-based common language and architecture to facilitate automated delivery, update and management of content assets in a trusted fashion without manual packaging or knowledge of remote Web-site structures. Today, the ICE 2.0 Specification provides automated content syndication using XML and Web Services messaging. If you are looking for a way to leverage the power of Web Services to automate data delivery, ICE may be your answer.

The ICE specification provides businesses with an XML-based common language and architecture that facilitates automatic exchanging, updating, supplying and controlling of assets in a trusted fashion without manual packaging or knowledge of remote Web site structures. For consumer Web sites, end users benefit from more complete, easier-to-use Web destinations that reduce the frustration of having to surf through many inadequate narrowly focused Web sites to find what they need.

The companies that developed ICE were evenly split between software vendors and users of technology. This means that it has some real user requirements. National Semiconductor stressed how important information is both in the sales cycle as well as to support the product. National Semiconductor looked forward to scaling and personalization the current ICE-based catalog process. CNET was both an aggregator and exporter of content. CNET looked to ICE to make this process both standard and easy. News Internet Services believed ICE would reduce engineering resources spent on developing syndication technology.

ICE 1.0 was published in 1998 and posted as a Note to the World Wide Web Consortium in 1999. See at http://www.w3.org/TR/NOTE-ice.