Think about your daily work. You probably use many different applications. One for charts, one for news, one for a list of clients, and maybe a few others for specific tasks.
Imagine you’re an analyst looking at a stock. You might see a company ticker like “MSFT” in a news app. To look at its chart, you have to remember or copy “MSFT,” open your chart app, and paste it in. Then, to read more about the company, you might go to another app and type it in again.
This is a common problem. It’s like having a bunch of great tools on your desk that can’t be used together. The FDC3 (Financial Desktop Connectivity and Collaboration Consortium) standard is here to fix this.
The Challenge: The Isolated Financial Desktop
The financial world is complex and moves at a high speed. To keep up, people use a lot of different applications at once. A typical desktop on a trading floor might have several monitors, each with different apps showing market data, news feeds, charts, and trading systems.
The big problem is that these applications often don’t talk to each other. They act like separate islands. A user has to manually move information from one app to another. This “friction” slows everything down and can lead to mistakes. It’s a huge headache and a big reason why innovation on the desktop has been so slow.
The FINOS Solution: FDC3 as a Universal Translator
FDC3 is a way for different financial desktop applications to speak the same language. It’s a set of open rules that lets them understand each other and share information, even if they were built by different companies. It’s like a universal translator for your desktop apps.
FDC3 works through two main ideas:
- Sharing Context: It allows apps to share a “topic” or a piece of information. For example, if you select a company ticker like “MSFT” in one app, all your other apps like your chart, news, and trading apps can instantly know you are focused on MSFT and automatically show you its details. This saves you from having to type or copy and paste.
- Intents (or Actions): FDC3 also defines standard actions. One app can “ask” another app to do something. For example, your trading app could send a message to a chart app that says, “View chart for MSFT,” and the chart would open automatically.
Why FDC3 Matters: The Value for Everyone
FDC3 isn’t just a technical idea; it’s a tool that makes your work life easier and more productive. The value is clear for everyone involved:
- For Users: You work faster and get a clearer view. By removing the need to manually move data between apps, you can complete tasks much quicker. Your workflow becomes smooth, not a series of stops and starts. This helps you make better and faster decisions.
- For Technology Teams: FDC3 helps you end the “integration nightmare.” Instead of building one-off connections between every single app, you can build to a single standard. This saves time and money, prevents being locked into a single vendor, and allows you to introduce new tools much more quickly.
- For Vendors: By supporting FDC3, vendors can ensure their applications can easily connect to any other FDC3-enabled app. This makes their products more valuable to customers and helps grow their business.
A Story of Open Collaboration
The FDC3 standard is already being used by major firms like BMO, Morgan Stanley, UBS and it is a result of many people working together. Developers from competing banks, software companies, and other fintech firms all have a seat at the table. They openly discuss and agree on how this standard should work. This shows the true power of open source: people coming together to solve a shared industry problem for the good of everyone.
By joining the FINOS FDC3 community, you’re not just contributing to a project; you’re helping to build a more open and connected future for everyone in finance.
How to Get Started with FDC3
Ready to make your work life easier? Here are some simple ways to get involved and learn more about FDC3:
- For Developers: Check out the FDC3 GitHub repository to see the code and documentation. You can start by helping with a small issue, suggesting an improvement, or taking free training.
- For Business Users: You have a lot to offer! Check out the FDC3 page here for an overview and sign up for more information.
Author: Ali Nawaz, FINOS Ambassador, Grandmaster in Google’s ML Campaigns and Community Organizer at TensorFlow User Group Islamabad