EIP...you might think the "E" means excitement!
What an honor to be able to make the first post to our AIIM/EIP Blog! It would be hard to go overboard describing how Excited we at Xerox are about the potential that EIP has for our customers and partners.
[A sidebar for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about: EIP stands for Extensible Interface Platform--it's a software platform. We added it to our multifunction products so developers can use standard web-based tools to create server-based applications that can be configured for the touch-screen or user interface. In other words, with EIP, developers can easily create applications that are tailored to meet specific business needs like “fax to accounts payable” or “submit to claims department.”]And now back to my Excitement…
We’ve all seen how technological development waxes and wanes on any given product. Sometimes a steady evolution and other times more of an explosion. In my view, today’s tricked-out digital copier is in the latter camp, bursting with capability and potential. But the most useful innovations – the most powerful – are those that (despite their power and capability) are intuitive and simple to the end user. And, it seems to me that the most likely innovations are those that are enabled by platforms that are not only powerful, but also easily within the reach of the largest number of developers. That’s why EIP is so exciting – it allows developers to fine-tune their applications to work just the way our customers want by providing (among other things) complete access to the user interface. This affords the developer tremendous creative freedom to make the highly capable appear simple and intuitive. And since EIP is based on standard web technologies, the development environment is straightforward and easily within reach of even a beginning developer.
So there it is! Why I think EIP is so cool (and useful)! Tell us what you think--we're going to be blogging about it right up to and throughout the AIIM/On Demand tradeshow (where we'll be showcasing the applications). The show is in Boston April 16-18. The posts about EIP will be labeled as such, but regular blogging will continue and we'll also be chronicling the entire show on an event blog--stay tuned.
If you are a customer – challenge us with what you would like us to add – or change. If you are a developer tell us what you think about EIP, what you think you can do with it, and what we can do to make it better for all of us!
Best Regards,
Roger
Roger Ellefson
Manager, Office Solutions Marketing
Xerox