In a joint presentation at the GML Relay in Emmen, Netherlands, Snowflake Software and Oracle Corporation demonstrated how easy it can be to exchange GML(Geography Markup Language) data with an enterprise database.

The GML Relay event was organised by Netherlands Society for Earth Observation and Geo-informatics, and hosted by Topografische Dienst in Emmen, Netherlands on 13th December. The aim of the event was to test whether the GML tools currently available truly support the easy exchange of data between systems. The task set for each of the five participants was to read the GML file output by the previous participant, to edit the data, and to output the modified GML file for the next participant to read. Snowflake's GO Loader passed the test with flying colours, being the only technology able to read the output files from all the other participants despite the fact that each system output it's own flavour of Dutch GML. GO Loader was able to achieve this because of it's unique XML Schema parsing technology which enables GO Loader to work with any GML format without prior knowledge of the format, without requiring software change, and without the creation of bespoke scripting files.

Eddie Curtis (Snowflake Software) surprised the Emmen audience by admitting that he had arrived at the event without preparing any software or a data model to hold the Dutch data. However, thanks to the high productivity of GO Loader's graphical data modelling interface he was able to create a data model, define rules for translating the Dutch GML, and load the data into Oracle 9i Spatial in just the 15 minutes allotted for the demonstration.

For more information about GO Loader visit
http://www.snowflakesoft.co.uk/goloader

For an example of GO Loader working with Top10NL data visit
http://www.snowflakesoft.co.uk/goloader/demo