Standards helping open things up

The days of expensive custom interfaces may be coming to an end. A number of standards have developed in the IT financial services arena that give developers and third party vendors a common set of code to write to. But which standard will survive is yet to be seen. Below is a look at some old and new standards: * ODBC (Open Database Connectivity) This standard enables applications, including browsers, to interface or communicate with database apps via SQL queries. * SQL (Structured Query Language) A query language developed by IBM that has become one of the leading standards for querying databases in a client/server environment. * XML (eXtensible Markup Language) Enables Web masters to create their own tags so the structure of their data can be more accurately captured. Useful for loan apps and other more detailed forms. * OFX (Open Financial Exchange) A communication protocol spearheaded by industry giants such as Microsoft. OFX is actually an extension of eXtenseible Markup Language. * OFX 2.0 Leading OFX solution providers have begun work on the second generation OFX, known as OFX 2.0 * IFX (Interactive Financial Exchange) A standard many in the industry are hopeful will become the leading standard developers and vendors will write to in the future.