ISO Standard to Improving eCommerce
Today the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) in Geneva, Switzerland published ISO 8000-115, a standard for authoritative and verifiable identifiers designed to improve the speed and accuracy of eCommerce and the supply chain.
ISO 8000-115 is part of the international standard for data quality: It explains that an “identifier” or reference is an alias for an authoritative legal description.
Every product or service has a “reference” or part number that is listed on the invoice or receipt that suppliers give to their customers. This line item “part number” on the receipt or invoice may be accompanied by a short description, but what few customers realize is it is also the reference for the authoritative description of the product or service, the legal description of what was purchased. It is this full legal description that buyers need if they are to find suitable products, to make an informed decision, or to account accurately for what they spend.
The first requirement of ISO 8000-115 is that the company that issued the identifier is recognizable. ISO 8000-115 requires that an identifier (reference, part number serial number, asset number) be formatted with a prefix that can be used to look up who issued the identifier. Applied to part number S1012, the part number becomes Martin:S1012. It really is that simple: Try a browser search for S1012, and then try Martin:S1012. You get faster, more relevant results, because the principles of ISO 8000-115 were adopted by the internet search engines when the standard was first published as a draft in 2015.
The second requirement of ISO 8000-115 is that the quality identifier can be used to obtain the Authoritative Legal Specification (ALS). For this, we need an ISO 8000 115 Prefix Name Server (PNS). Just as the Domain Name Server (DNS) links domain names to email and web servers, a Prefix Name Server (PNS) links prefixes to specification servers. ECCMA has created the first publicly searchable ISO 8000-115 PNS, and you can register your ISO 8000-115 Quality Identifier Prefix (QUIP) with quiplab.com.
The email and web servers you specify in the DNS must respond to standard protocols, and it is the same with the PNS. The specification servers specified in the PNS must respond to published protocols. The most common specification server protocol is ISO 29002. If a supplier or manufacturer does not yet have a specification server, they can upload their specification to the ECCMA Shared Master Data (eSMD™) server. The eSMD is ISO 29002 compliant, and there is no cost to upload a specification to the eSMD, to store a specification on the eSMD, or to download a specification from the eSMD.
In the eSMD all specifications are stored in xml in Structured Data Format (SDFx). This is an open ISO format (ISO 22745-40) that is easy for suppliers to create using their existing catalogs, and it is easy for buyers to use to create the descriptions and classifications they need in their master data. Creating a specification as an SDFx file is straight forward: There is a free SDFx file builder at http://sdfxbuilder.com. Sheron Koshy at sheron.koshy@eccma.org can assist in converting spreadsheets or databases to the SDFx format.
Note: ECCMA is a not for profit membership association headquartered in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, USA. The association was formed in 1999 to develop open international standards and best practices to improve the quality of master data.
