Description
This paper provides a basic introduction to the Distribution Element 2.0 (DE2), one of the important OASIS EDXL standards for emergency management and response. As with the earlier version, the DE2 serves the same two primary purposes: (1) the DE2 allows an organization to wrap important pieces of emergency information into a single easy-to-distribute XML "package", and (2) the DE allows an organization to "address" the package in flexible ways to support intelligent routing, including specifying recipients by role, by geographic area, or by keywords. With the DE, organizations can use standardized lists of roles or keywords, or their own lists for additional flexibility and tailoring. This version of the DE expands the ability to use local community-defined terms, uses a profile of the Geographic Markup Language (GML), follows best practices for naming conventions, provides the capability to link content objects, and is reorganized for increased flexibility and reuse of common types. Fortunately, the DE is a simple, concise standard. This paper describes the DE version 2.0, highlighting changes from the original version. After reading this short paper, the reader will be ready to begin using the DE.
