The Web Services Advisor
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Continued from Part One
Service-oriented architecture (SOA) holds out the promise to dramatically overhaul the way that applications are deployed in today's enterprises, cut development time and costs, and allow businesses to create new applications almost on an as-needed basis. It's an architecture in which software components are exposed as services on the network, and once written, can be re-used whenever necessary for different applications. In this way, developing new applications on an SOA can be like stringing together existing services Lego-block style.
But developing an SOA can be a tricky and difficult task, particularly because it involves not only an enterprise's IT staff and infrastructure, but the business side of the company as well. It involves a top-down look at computing resources and at business resources as well — and making sure that the architecture is aligned with current and future business plans.
In this second of a two-part column, we'll get some advice from the pros on how to build an SOA, and look at a sampling of products that might help.
Getting started on building an SOA
The first step in building out an SOA has nothing to do with technology — it has to do with management. An SOA has to, above all, serve business needs, and so "when putting together an SOA, the business people need to be involved," recommends Patrick Vallaeys, vice president of marketing for Web services vendor Infravio. The IT department and the business end of things need to meet and agree to the SOA's purpose. Most important is that the business people define the overall goals for the company over the next several years, and detail the kinds of business processes and relationships with business partners that will most likely be needed to accomplish that.
Only after that has been agreed upon should the IT department begin its work. Based on the business vision, "The architectural team has to come up with an overall architecture," says Jason Bloomberg, senior analyst with the ZapThink research and analysis firm. He says that not all enterprises may have the expertise to develop this in-house, and so it may be worthwhile to look to an outside firm for help.
That initial architecture "gives the big picture, but then you need a real-life technology solution," he continues. "So start with a pilot project, and pick a problem that you know can be solved. Don't try to reinvent the world; solve that problem with the technology, learn some lessons from it, and move on to the next one."
In this way, he says, you will be able to gradually build out an SOA, based on your initial architecture, learning and making changes along the way.
This top-down approach, though, may not suit all businesses, notes Gregg Bjork, senior vice president of products and services for Web services vendor Systinet.
"People come at it from different directions," he says. "Those whose companies have a strong, central architectural focus can do it from the top down. But those companies that are highly distributed can do it from the bottom up."
So, for example, divisions and departments of companies that are entrepreneurial can build Web service applications individually, and ultimately those groups will come together and decide on an overall architecture, based on the applications that they've already built, and ones they expect to build in the future.
Products For Building an SOA
There are an exceedingly wide range of products that can help build an SOA, and since Web services and SOAs are so closely related, to a certain extent you can say that any product that helps build Web services is also helping build an SOA.
But there are a number of categories of products that are clearly targeted at building SOAs, notes ZapThink's Bloomberg. Applications that deal with identity management issues are vital, he says, because SOAs will require that users be able to have a single sign-on to use the many Web services incorporated into the SOA. For similar reasons, general security applications are important as well.
Specifically, he adds, "XML can go right through firewalls, so XML firewalls or applications firewalls," are an important tool as well.
Web services management software, life-cycle management tools, and service-oriented architecture enablement software will all become increasingly important, and without them, building and managing an SOA will not be possible.
However, at this point, there is no clear software suite or mix of tools that people agree is vital to building an SOA. The technology is young enough that it's still a mix-and-match world when it comes to buying the right set of software.
Where SOA goes from here
As with all new technologies whose time has not quite come, it's unclear when SOAs will become commonplace. Gartner analyst Daryl Plummer told Computerworld that he estimates that fewer than 30 percent of IT shops are doing SOA-based development work today. But, he told the newspaper, he expects that five years from now, some 85 percent of them will build applications using SOA concepts.
If he's right, that means in all likelihood, you'll be following suit. So even if you're not ready to jump in with both feet, it's time to start looking at SOA-related products, and taking a look at company's overall architecture with an eye toward ultimately building an SOA.
For SOA-related Webcasts:
For SOA-related Experts:
For SOA-related Articles and White Papers:
About the Author
Preston Gralla, a well-known technology expert, is the author of more than 20 books, including "How the Internet Works," which has been translated into 14 languages and sold several hundred thousand copies worldwide. He is an expert on Web services and the author of a major research and white paper for the Software and Information Industry Association on the topic. Gralla was the founding managing editor of PC Week, a founding editor and then editor and editorial director of PC/Computing, and an executive editor for ZDNet and CNet. He has written about technology for more than 15 years for many major magazines and newspapers, including PC Magazine, Computerworld, CIO Magazine, eWeek and its forerunner PC Week, PC/Computing, the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and the Dallas Morning News among others. As a well-known technology guru, he appears frequently on TV and radio shows and networks, including CNN, MSNBC, ABC World News Now, the CBS Early Show, PBS's All Things Considered and others. He has won a number of awards for his writing, including from the Computer Press Association for the Best Feature in a Computer Publication. He can be reached at preston@gralla.com.
