So it looks like the Embedded Twitter Feed broke - maybe it's our fault, but it's obviously much easier to just blame that new guy in charge of Twitter. In any case, it's a good opportunity to bring back the News & Updates section of this WOOLPlatform.EU website.

So, what's been happening with WOOL? Quite a bit actually. Development on the platform software has been steady, with a 154 commits to our main GitHub repository in the last year. Obviously the number of commits is not really the main Key Performance Indicator (pardon my French) of the platform, but at least it shows a continued support to the project that is now approaching its 4th birthday on May 16th of this year (actually development started earlier, but this was the creation date for the repository).

Looking at these updates in a bit more detail you can see that most of the updates relate to the development of the WOOL Web Service. This is our server-component that allows you to run WOOL dialogues in a client-server architecture. From the early beginnings in the Council of Coaches project, WOOL was used in such a client-server scenario, although initially the server-component was handled by a WOOL-integration in the eHealth platform developed by Roessingh Research and Development. Towards the very end of the project, a stand-alone web component was created in order to facilitate easier integration with third-party software, specifically with the Agents United platform - an open platform for multi-agent conversational systems (the link takes you to the paper by Tessa Beinema et al., which gives a nice overview of this initiative).

But we're drifting off-topic... The point is that over the last year the WOOL Web Service has become a much more robust and stable component. A component that is being used in real-world use scenarios, in various EU R&D Research Projects, and in commercial applications by Innovation Sprint. The service supports basic account management, the execution of WOOL dialogues, and various ways of integrating with external data through WOOL Variables, and it has become a great starting point for exploring the use of WOOL.

If you want to know more about the WOOL Web Service, we have added a dedicated WOOL Web Service page to our Documentation Hub. That is in addition to the detailed tutorials about installation, and getting started that have been updated to reflect the latest changes.

So, what's next? WOOL is still in a very technical state of development, and we realize that it takes quite a bit to get started with using WOOL. Besides feature updates across the various components that make up the WOOL Platform - a key focus will be on simplifying the process of setting up a WOOL application.

If you want to stay up-to-date, follow us on Twitter @WOOLPlatform, and as always, if you have any question, please contact us at info@woolplatform.eu. Bye for now!