1. IFX BIAN Services Work Group
Introduction
January 27, 2015
Welcome!
I’m glad you could join us.

2. Why we’re here
IFX and BIAN have many members in common with an interest in:
Adding depth to the mapping between the standards
Defining standard services in the IFX specification aligned with BIAN service definitions
Documenting best practices for implementations using the two standards together
IFX Forum and BIAN are leaders in standardization in the banking industry.
And both organizations have strength and roots in Service Oriented Architecture. It’s no surprise, then, that we have many member companies in common. And in both formal and informal discussion with these members we have found a strong desire to bring to market the fruits of efforts made in both standards.
I will also point out that many companies that are not yet members of one or both organizations have also shown a real, active interest in seeing this work go further.
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3. IFX Forum and BIAN Collaboration
In 2009 IFX Forum and BIAN began working together to explore practical, real-world scenarios where our standards work together to improve banking systems.
In 2013 we published a Proof of Concept Report demonstrating the potential value to banks of combining the two standards.
In 2014 BIAN led a collaboration with CMU students to further explore the potential for implementing BIAN services with IFX and ISO message standards.
IFX Forum and BIAN have been collaborating for quite a while.
In 2013 both IFX Forum and BIAN invested considerable time in a Proof of Concept project with a very successful outcome. We published a joint report at the end of 2013.
In 2014 BIAN led a collaboration with Carnegie-Mellon masters program students to further explore how the BIAN service landscape would work with the IFX message specification and ISO messages.
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4. POC Findings
A key finding of the Proof of Concept is that both standards have the built-in modularity to adapt to the constraints of existing platforms without sacrificing integrity.
The BIAN-defined service domains can be mapped to, and implemented, using a pre-existing service oriented messaging standard – in this case, the IFX Business Message Specification.
The IFX message and service framework can be used to implement a pre-existing view of standard business services – in this case as defined in the BIAN service landscape and service domains.
The findings of the IFX-BIAN PoC are summarized neatly here.
Both standards have the necessary capabilities to work in concert with each other and the SOA emphasis of both standards makes for a natural fit for implementation.
Just as importantly, SOA implementations can be accomplished incrementally within the constraints of existing banking infrastructures.
Implementers can map their plans to the BIAN Service Landscape, carve out proper service boundaries and use the IFX Business Message Specification as an enabling standard.
December 2013

5. Great Potential for Collaboration
At the end of the proof of concept we did a brief review of where the two standards overlap now – areas where immediate SOA solutions might be viable in the banking landscape.
We also see many areas where there will be value in pursuing further work enriching the possibilities for future implementations.
When we completed the Proof of Concept, several experts in the organizations reviewed the standards together to establish a preliminary map of where there is overlapping content and capability. This map shows the results of that initial effort.
The Dark Blue areas show business capabilities that both standards address with significant content. The lighter blue areas indicate some overlap, but with gaps on one side or the other. And the gray areas represent areas where the overlap is less significant or is absent.
It’s important to understand that both IFX Forum and BIAN are member driven organizations. Our priorities for full content development reflect the needs of members.
Any portion of the landscape may be tackled based on member interests.
Preliminary results
December 2013

6. CMU Capstone project
The CMU Capstone project team reached the same conclusion we did and envisioned future research…
Option 1: Expanding Implementation Area
Option 2: Exploring Other Message Standards
Option 3: Moving to Other Required Layers
Option 4: Implementing Model to an Actual System
I mentioned the Carnegie-Mellon Capstone project earlier.
The Carnegie-Mellon students came to similar conclusions as IFX and BIAN did in their proof of concept report. The standards can readily be used in conjunction with each other to develop viable solutions.
The Capstone project team recommended several possible avenues for further research and work effort. As you can see here, the IFX BIAN Services Work Group is likely to address two of those topics head-on and option 4 – live implementation – may result as a by-product of the work or as a project within a member company.
Of course, IFX will not be tackling a project to map the BIAN SL to another message standard although BIAN members may choose to do that at some time in the future.
This is a good time to point out that IFX Forum is a submitting organization to ISO which was also examined in the Capstone project. IFX Forum developed - and continues to provide maintenance support for the ISO payment initiation (pain), cash management (camt), remittance (remt) and other messages in that standard. We are therefore equipped to submit proposals to the RA if BIAN members or the new work group members find the need for enhancements there. This is another example of the synergies between the organizations.
The IFX-BIAN Services WG draft charter addresses these.
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7. From Concept to Reality
Proofs of Concepts
Add depth and detail to mapping chart
Initiate IFX project to create BIAN Services
Publish BIAN Service implementations in IFX
Publish updated map
Publish regular updates
Define BIAN Services in the IFX Standard
2015
In October 2014 I spent time with the members of BIAN at their face to face meeting in Nice, France. Earlier in the year BIAN architects joined IFX at their face-to-face meeting in Orlando, Fl.
This diagram shows a very high level outline of 2 workstreams we readily imagine for future collaboration. Of course, we are confident these efforts can proceed based on the results of the proofs of concepts I discussed earlier.
On the left, we see that there is work to do to map the standards overlap at a more detailed level. On the right we see the effort to produce implementable service interfaces using the IFX standard and the BIAN service definitions.
We do not envision these workstreams to be exclusively in one organization or the other. The corporate logos above each column simply indicate where the bulk of expertise for each is likely to be found.
The IFX work group that we are talking about today, though, is quite likely to put most of its efforts on Define BIAN Service in the IFX Standard with an examination of the mapping chart and members’ interests and priorities informing the work.

8. Membership Information
IFX Work Groups
IFX Work Groups are the means by which additional content is developed in the IFX Specification
Member volunteers do all of the work
Must belong to a member company
Small business members have equal standing and equal voice in all work groups
IFX is pleased to invite others to join us in order to participate in this effort.
There is historical precedence…
Let me take a few minutes to talk about how IFX Forum Work Groups operate.
First, all new content in the IFX specification is developed in work group, by member volunteers. Only IFX members can participate directly in the work and they alone choose where to devote their efforts. It’s not surprising then, that our members are typically among the leaders when it comes to implementation.
IFX Forum offers 2 levels of full membership. Corporate and large bank members pay dues of just under $10K and Small Business, small bank members pay $ Members at each of those levels have equal standing in work groups. We believe those rates are a bargain for those who participate.
If you are not currently a member, but have an interest in this work, you may want to consider membership. There is, by the way, historical precedent for several companies joining IFX Forum more or less simultaneously in order to improve the standard and its fit in a particular industry.
We are leaders in the ATM/POS standard space, for example, because market movers in that space chose IFX Forum as the most logical place for collaboration.
Membership Information
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9. IFX Governance Manage Legal business IFX Board of Directors
Appoint Steering Committee
IFX Steering Committee
Manage IFX business day-to-day
Steering approves WG charter
IFX Architecture Committee
Manage IFX Specification
Content approved by Architecture
Define specification content
IFX Working Groups
Typically, at least 3 members sponsor WG
Must be member to participate
No limit to # participants
Operate best with both business and tech experts participating
The IFX Forum has an established governance model as depicted here.
Note that the IFX Forum Steering Committee must approve the charter of a work group and the Architecture Committee approves the content. Gaining Steering’s approval of the charter simply ensures that we coordinate work effectively for member benefit.
Work Groups develop all of the content including:
New Objects
New Messages
New Service Definitions
Enhancements and corrections
Documentation
In order to be effective on those fronts, the Forum does not limit the # participants in a Work Group. In fact, we have found that more participation usually means that more perspective is brought into the mix and that improves the end product. That additional perspective comes from the mix of companies and mix of business and technical experts involved in the work.
IFX Working Groups

10. How work groups operate
Work Group adopts a Charter
Work Groups develop proposals which are evaluated by Architecture and ultimately included in the standard
Regular WG meetings
Schedule is determined by group members – typically weekly or bi-weekly teleconference calls
Calls may be scheduled/repeated in order to gather input from our global membership
Webex collaboration available for all meetings
Members only web site collaboration space provided by KAVI
Face-to-face meetings in conjunction with IFX member meetings or one-off as needed
Joint meetings with BIAN are anticipated for this group
As I mentioned earlier, every Work Group sets themselves a Charter which gets approved by the Steering Committee.
Content development ultimately takes the form of written proposals that are reviewed by the Architecture Committee. This process can take weeks or months and may evolve over the course of years depending on the scope of the charter, the work products and member commitment.
But here’s the important thing: During the development of content by the work group members, many things become clear to participants far in advance of the formal publication of new versions:
what best practices are emerging,
which use cases are fully supported,
which proposals are approved by Architecture and
the pace with which work is proceeding.
This has immediate and positive impact on in-house developments and designs of the participants. Members don’t wait until formal publication of their work to actualize the benefits of expert collaboration.
And as you can see here, that collaboration takes many forms.

11. Goals of Work Group The BIANWG may:
Create defined service interfaces – i.e. working code – in the form of IFX Services that implement chosen capabilities from the BIAN SL;
Create a more detailed mapping of the current IFX BMS to the current BIAN Service Landscape;
Recommend strategies and content for the IFX standard to improve the overlapping capabilities – i.e. extends the applicable mapping of the 2 standards;
Define and document best practices for implementing BIAN services using the IFX standard; this may take the form of a new implementation guide or supplements to the current SOA Implementation Guide;
Recommend or implement enhancements to the IFX code generator to generate working service interfaces in XML Schema, WSDLs or other chosen implementation technology;
Establish further IFX organizational expertise with the BIAN landscape or otherwise enhance the collaboration with BIAN;
This slide itemizes many of the things we envision for the work group, but the work group participants will be the ones who decide what matters most and they prioritize the work based on their self-interests as well as IFX community spirit.
I do want to call attention to a couple items here, though.
IFX members have access to a code generator that creates valid, compliant XML Schemas from the BMS repository. I think it quite likely that this work group will define enhancements to the BMS that result in WSDLs, interface schemas or similar items being generated from the repository. You can just imagine the value that will bring in terms of programmer productivity and quality development.
I would also be surprised if the ongoing discussions of design trade-offs, implementation technologies and available tools doesn’t result documented best practices for using the standards together. And I will remind you that the participants will get the value of that work long before others see published documents.
© Copyright IFX Forum, Inc. 2015
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12. About the IFX BMS Repository
The IFX Message standard is housed in a data base repository that is accessible to any interested party.
Members and subscribers have privileged access to Current and Work-in-Progress versions
Members and subscribers have access to additional tools, documents and alternative formats
All registered users have free access to navigate the current published standard on-line
Before we close, I’m going to make a couple of points about the BMS Database as we like to refer to the repository.
This slide shows a screen shot of the database UI and calls out some of the materials available to members.
Most pertinent to our discussion here is the fact that members have access to Work-in- Progress and code generator. As content is approved by the Architecture Committee, it is incorporated into the WIP instance of the standard and is staged for the next release.
The code generator operates on the WIP version of the spec, too.
Members and subscribers can automatically create XML Schema files by positioning themselves on any IFX tag (message, component, data element) then click on download XSD.
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13. Service/Interface
Services are defined as a group of IFX Operations and Messages
The IFX Implementation Guide provides advice on best-practices for service implementations
The schema generator can be invoked to automatically create an XML schema based on the service definition.
One last point about the BMS DB.
IFX Forum does not currently prescribe service definitions, but the data base does have provisions for describing and storing them and generating schema consistent with those definitions.
I expect that the BIAN Services Work Group will be specifying improvements in this capability and will begin to define a namespace or some similar mechanism to store and generate BIAN-IFX Compliant services.
© Copyright IFX Forum, Inc. 2015
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14. Next Steps Preliminary Schedule and Key Events
FEB 2015 – Organize the work group including initial roster, prioritized interests, preliminary deliverables list
FEB 2015 – Identify WG sponsors
FEB 2015 – Initial education and training for new participants.
FEB - MAR 2015 – Create a preliminary work schedule, establish work streams as necessary
MAR – APR 2015 begin work
APR 27, 2015 – First face-to-face meeting of the BIANWG in conjunction with the IFX Annual meeting in Boston, MA
TBD 2015 – Review BMS Proposals with the IFX SOA WG and the IFX Architecture Committee
TBD 2015 – Review progress with BIAN members
So… time to get on with the work…
This is a preliminary – perhaps too aggressive – schedule for the work group. We expect the first month or two to be organizational in nature; rounding up participants, ironing out schedules, drafting straw man task lists, etc.
We also intend to support the group with education. Both IFX and BIAN understand that many of you have not worked with one, the other or both of our specifications. We all have a stake in the success and that means providing you as much education as necessary to get off to a good start.
IFX Forum will be meeting Face-to-Face in Boston the week of April So the real goal of this early draft of the schedule is to establish some working relationships and to make enough organizational progress so the face-to-face can lead to some truly productive working sessions.
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15. ?????? Questions Thank you for joining us here today.
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16. Additional Resources
In addition to answering some questions here today, there is much more to be learned via the resources indicated below.
Direct Inquiries To
Organization
Name
IFX Forum
Judith Vanderkay, Director, Public Relations
IFX Community Forum
Reference Documents
Topic
Type of Document
Reference to Document
IFX Standards
IFX Standard Online
Everyone in attendance here today is welcome to contact me directly at my address; You can find membership material on our website at and there is quite a bit of other material there as well including the slides from this presentation and a link to the recorded version of this webcast.
Thank you and goodbye.
© Copyright IFX Forum, Inc. 2014