Where Do You Want to Go in Your SOA Adoption Journey?

Abstract

Not every company has the same needs in adopting a service-oriented architecture (SOA). The authors compare four options for increasing system flexibility.T hese days, almost every CIO or IT manager is looking into service-oriented architecture (SOA). A year ago, The McKinsey Quarterly surveyed 72 senior IT executives about their investment priorities and found that 64 percent were planning to implement SOA in 2007. 1 Forrester reported in February 2007 that 62 percent of its surveyed companies from the North American and European regions are either using SOA or planning to do so within the next 12 months. 2 Interestingly, adopting SOA isn't the same as deploying a software application, which can be a one-time activity. Rather, it's a journey for an organization over a long period of time-an important detail for everyone involved to understand.Although a few vendors claim that SOA can be quickly and easily implemented with their products, the overall understanding in the industry is that SOA adoption is an evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, process. Beginning the JourneyTechnically speaking, SOA is an architectural pattern that says that computational units (such as system modules) should be loosely coupled through their service interfaces for delivering the desired functionality. This pattern can be applied to the architecture of a single system (such as a quality management information or insurance claims management system) or the overall architecture of all applications in an en- 36IT Pro May/June 2008 P u b l i s h e d b y t h e I E E E C o m p u t e r S o c i e t y 1520-9209/08/$25.00

A survey on reuse in the business process management domain

“…This is an analysis paper provided by Mulik et al (2008). This is an analysis paper provided by Mulik et al (2008).…”

Service Oriented Architecture Conceptual Landscape

“…Conscious of the differing needs of organisations, Mulik, Ajgaonkar, and Sharma (Mulik et al, 2008) explore four options for increasing flexibility of an SOA style system. They identify SOA as, '...an evolutionary, rather than a revolutionary, process.…”