WhitePages.com Makes Free Search API Available to Developers

WhitePages.com, a leading Web site for finding contact information, today announced that it is making its data available for free in a beta Web services API. To kick off development, the company is sponsoring a contest awarding either a 50" HD Plasma TV or a 15" MacBook® Pro* computer for the best iPhone™* application and the best social networking application.

WhitePages.com provides free access to contact information for millions of people. In 2007 the company more than doubled the size of its database to nearly 180 million people which equals 80 percent of the U.S. adult population. Included in the company's database are 25 million at work listings which give consumers the flexibility to connect with others during the workday and offers an alternative to calling a home number when it is not convenient.

"WhitePages.com has always been focused on helping you find contact information for the people you care about," said Scott Ruthfield, vice president of engineering and technology at WhitePages.com. "The API enables people-centered developers to integrate the high quality data we provide into their own user experiences. Providing contact information in the context of other applications helps make the Internet a more connected place."

WhitePages.com is making available virtually all of the same data available on the Web site for free to developers as part of the beta Web services API. Included are the company's core search types including people search, reverse phone and reverse address. Developers can use the API to create consumer applications, Web sites, and mashups, including integrating into existing applications or combining with other Web service APIs.

More information on the API can be found on the WhitePages.com Developer Blog, and contest details and API documentation can be found at the WhitePages.com Developer Portal. Contest entries must be received no later than May 15, 2008. Winners will be notified on or around May 31, 2008.

To deliver the API to developers, WhitePages.com partnered with Mashery to provide core API management features including credential management, throttling, and metrics. Mashery is the leading provider of Web services and API management solutions, enabling companies to accelerate their web distribution channel.

About WhitePages.com
WhitePages.com, a privately held company based in Seattle, is the most trusted and comprehensive source for consumers to quickly and easily find relevant, accurate contact information in North America. The company's network of sites include WhitePages.com (www.whitepages.com), WhitePages.ca (www.whitepages.ca), 411.com (www.411.com), Address.com (www.address.com), PhoneNumber.com (www.phonenumber.com), and its 1,300 partner sites including Superpages.com, YellowPages.com and Canada411. The on-the-go user can also access contact information via cell phone, Blackberrys and other Web-enabled mobile devices.

*MacBook is a registered trademark and iPhone is a trademark of Apple, Inc.

Source: PRWeb

KnowledgeTree Document Management Software Launches SOAP Web Services

KnowledgeTree™, the leading commercial open source document management software vendor for small to medium-sized organizations, today announced the release of SOAP Web Services, providing third-party software developers with powerful new ways of integrating with the KnowledgeTree™ document management system.

"KnowledgeTree Web Services provide software developers with exciting new opportunities to develop applications around KnowledgeTree's document repository, irrespective of the platform or language utilized by the developer. We're looking forward to seeing innovative new uses of KnowledgeTree, from both the KnowledgeTree open source community and our commercial users," says Lead Architect Conrad Vermeulen of KnowledgeTree developers Jam Warehouse.

KnowledgeTree's SOAP Web Services provide a language independent, and platform independent interface to the functional core of the document management system. They allow the creation of extensions for KnowledgeTree, and the ability to develop and access KnowledgeTree functionality using various languages including PHP, C#.NET, Delphi, Java, Python, Ruby, C/C++. To assist developers, client libraries are available in a number of different languages.

KnowledgeTree's WebDAV interface has also been released under an open source license, the KnowledgeTree Public License, as part of KnowledgeTree Open Source Edition. The WebDAV interface, previously only available in commercial editions of KnowledgeTree, is a platform-independent extension of the HTTP protocol which allows users to collaboratively manage files within the KnowledgeTree document repository.

KnowledgeTree's vision is to make document management simple. The web-based and AJAX-enabled application is built on the popular open source LAMP (Apache/MySQL/PHP) stack. KnowledgeTree™ has significant community traction and has been downloaded more than 300 000 times to date. KnowledgeTree™ is used by small and big business alike, with users including Fortune 500 companies, community organizations, local and state governments and educational and scientific institutions around the world.

KnowledgeTree™ is available in three additions: KnowledgeTree™ Enterprise, KnowledgeTree™ SMB and KnowledgeTree™ Open Source. The commercial editions of KnowledgeTree™ are sold with access to priority support and offer additional functionality that provides a familiar Windows Explorer and Microsoft Office interface into the document repository and direct-to-repository scanning capability.

About KnowledgeTree - Document Management Made Simple
KnowledgeTree™ is a simple yet powerful, free, commercial open source and Web-based document management system built on the popular open source LAMP stack. It is the leading commercial open source document management system designed for the SMB and departmental user.

The application is available in three additions: KnowledgeTree Enterprise, KnowledgeTree SMB and KnowledgeTree Open Source. The commercial editions of KnowledgeTree are sold with access to priority support and offer additional functionality that provides a familiar Windows Explorer and Microsoft Office interface into the document repository and direct-to-repository scanning capability.

About Jam Warehouse
Jam Warehouse, the developers of KnowledgeTree, build business process management and web-based document management solutions for world-benchmarked organizations including international retailers, pre-press companies, newspaper groups, government entities, pharmaceutical and healthcare companies and even estate agencies. Jam Warehouse is headquartered in Cape Town, South Africa with an office in London, United Kingdom.

Source: PRWeb

What is a WSDL?

The Web Services Description Language (WSDL, pronounced 'wiz-dull' or spelled out, 'W-S-D-L') is an XML-based language that provides a model for describing Web services. Version 1.1 has not been endorsed by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Version 2.0, for which several drafts have been released, is expected to become a W3C recommendation.

WSDL is an XML-based service description on how to communicate using web services. The WSDL defines services as collections of network endpoints, or ports. WSDL specification provides an XML format for documents for this purpose.

The abstract definition of ports and messages is separated from their concrete use or instance, allowing the reuse of these definitions. A port is defined by associating a network address with a reusable binding, and a collection of ports define a service. Messages are abstract descriptions of the data being exchanged, and port types are abstract collections of supported operations. The concrete protocol and data format specifications for a particular port type constitutes a reusable binding, where the messages and operations are then bound to a concrete network protocol and message format. In this way, WSDL describes the public interface to the web service.

WSDL is often used in combination with SOAP and XML Schema to provide web services over the Internet. A client program connecting to a web service can read the WSDL to determine what functions are available on the server. Any special datatypes used are embedded in the WSDL file in the form of XML Schema. The client can then use SOAP to actually call one of the functions listed in the WSDL.

This definition is from The Wikipedia which is published under the GNU Free Documentation License.