This is interesting. Pearson has announced "the migration of all versions of its SIFWorks Agent Development Kit (ADK) to the business-friendly Apache 2.0 free and open source software license." SIF - or Schools Interoperability Framework (more here), is, as descirbed here by IBM, a mechanism for sharing data across school systems. In this it is similar to other data exchange systems (such as SADI), but agents are authenticated by a Zone Integration Server (ZIS) before messages are passed (there's an Open ZIS, and also a Pearson ZIS, among others). It makes sense for Pearson to open source its SIF implementation for two reasons. First, it undercuts other developers, and second, it extends acceptance of technology that supports its own digital content. On the other hand, Pearson may simply be abandoning a widely criticized SOAP implementation while opening the way for REST alternatives.
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