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Miscellaneous Tools

Some tools are used in stages in the life cycle of a smart card outside the software development stage—personalization tools, hardware diagnostic tools, and prototyping systems, for example—that can also be handy during the software development stage. For the sake of completeness, some of these are listed in Table 6.11.

Table 6.11. Miscellaneous tools.
Product Company Telephone WWW Email

AviSIM
OTA System
AU-Systems +468 726-7500 www.ausys.com ahg@ausys.se
AviSIM
Personalization
System
AU-Systems +468 726-7500 www.ausys.com ahg@ausys.se
AviSIMPOS AU-Systems +468 726-7500 www.ausys.com ahg@ausys.se
DataCard
150I
Personalization
SDK
DataCard +1 617 988 1763 www.datacard.com mark_iverson
@datacasrd.com
The Dumb Mouse cuba.xs4all.nl
/~hip/dumbmouse
.html
Execution
Analyser
Ashling +353 61 334466 www.ashling.com ashling@iol.ie
GePeto -
SIM
Personalization
Schlumberger +33 1 4746 6869 www.slb.com/et/ louis@montrouge
.ts.slb.com
HII 7 X 24
EFT
Transaction
System
Halcyon +1 206 746-4361 www.halcyon.com/hii hii@halcyon.com
Inverse
Reader
Digicash +31 20 592-9999 www.digicash.com info@digicash.nl
ROM
Prototyping
Card
Ashling +353 61 334466 www.ashling.com ashling@iol.ie
Smart Card Analyzer
and Manipulator
www.cypherpunks.to/scard/
Smart Card
Probes
Ashling +353 61 334466 www.ashling.com ashling@iol.ie
UbiQlink
Personalization
System
Ubiq +1 612 912-9401 www.ubiqinc.com dtusie@ubiqinc.com

Summary

National and international standards define smart card interfaces. ISO has specified one interface to the smart card. ETSI has defined another, SEIS a third. There are also industry-specific standards for both smart cards and smart card readers and terminals. With all of this standards activity, you’d think that seamless smart card interoperability could be assumed.

Most smart card systems have, however, been closed systems, consisting of a specific card from a card manufacturer working with a specific terminal from a terminal manufacturer. Sometimes the same company manufactured both the card and the reader. As a result, standard-specified, paper interoperability has rarely been subjected to a reality check. As we move from closed smart card systems with proprietary components to open smart card systems with inter-changeable parts, surprisingly we are discovering that conscientious people have interpreted the many standards differently and that there is a need for additional discussion and specification.

Smart card software reflects this transitory situation. Most smart card development kits are still card and reader specific. Some have externalized the card and reader descriptions so that the buyer of the kit can adapt the software to new cards and readers. There are also architectures operating system extensions such as OpenCard and PC/SC coming along that localize card and reader differences and provide the foundation to build card- and reader-independent applications.


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