An Implementor's Guide to Service Oriented Architecture: Getting it Right

The title of this book includes the word implementor's. That single word describes the focus of our work here. This book is a treatment of the practical issues an implementor would face when implementing a SOA. There are other very fine books on standards and basic education about SOA and web services. In fact, if you are not familiar with the web service standards, you might find some of this other material very useful as preparatory reading prior to digging into the implementation issues described herein.

It has frequently been observed that you can have an understanding of the philosophy of a SOA and the specifics of web service standards and still not know how to implement a SOA system that will provide lasting value to your enterprise. This book is an expedition through the considerations above the standards that come from practical experience in implementing a SOA. It is a practical book for the practitioner. The goal is to make the implementation of a SOA simpler and to encourage more people to deploy their own SOA. After all, today a SOA is considered the best way to create an integrated system that implements a consistent architecture on a large scale, providing flexibility and agility across applications and data for long lasting value.

As with other complex topics, those who have the right background, work on the issues daily, and study the topic in depth, will achieve an understanding more comprehensive than others. There are a handful of true experts in the industry that have achieved insights over time from their singular focus on the topics at hand. A main purpose of this book is to capture hard gained knowledge and make it available to a wide audience. Leveraging this expertise, in a way that we can all benefit from, has from the beginning been the primary goal of our endeavors.

Hopefully we have achieved our goal.

David Besemer, Chief Technology Officer, Composite Software David joined Composite in 2002 as VP of Engineering and then transitioned to the CTO role in January 2006. At Composite David pioneered industry first information server products for high performance query optimization and SOA data services. He joined Composite from his freelance CTO consulting practice where he provided software technology intelligence to venture capital firms. Previously, David served as CTO of eStyle and ran a successful enterprise software consulting practice.

Paul Butterworth, Chief Technology Officer, AmberPoint Paul is the CTO for AmberPoint, the leading provider of SOA management solutions. In recognition for his work at AmberPoint, Paul was named one of InfoWorld s Top 25 CTOs for 2007. Prior to founding AmberPoint, he was the CTO for Forte Tools at Sun where he was voted a Distinguished Engineer by his peers and was responsible for the technical strategy for the Sun developer tools products. As a co-founder of Forte Software, he was the Chief Architect and Senior Vice President of Engineering and Customer Services.

Luc Clément, Co-Chairman, OASIS UDDI Specification Technical Committee Luc, an industry expert in UDDI standards, served as Co-Chair of OASIS UDDI Specification Technical Committee from 2003 to 2007. In this role, he oversaw development of all UDDI registry-related specifications, personally editing and co-authoring the OASIS UDDI Version 2 and 3 specifications and Technical Notes, which have been a major catalyst for broad enterprise adoption of SOA. Luc currently serves as the Senior Director of Product Management at Active Endpoints.

Jim Green, Chairman and CEO, Composite Software Jim, a noted enterprise computing technology visionary and entrepreneur, guides Composite Software strategy and operations. Prior to Composite, Jim served as webMethods CTO, Executive Vice President of Product Development, and Board of Directors member. Jim was CEO and co-founder of Active Software, where he grew the company from a start-up to an industry leader in Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) software. During his seven year tenure at Sun Microsystems, he led the development of the CORBA specification.

Hemant Ramachandra, Managing Director, Business Systems Integration, BearingPoint Hemant is responsible for strategy, sales, development and delivery of Technology Integration solutions. With more than 17 years experience he has led several information systems strategy, architecture and integration projects. Hemant specializes in service oriented architecture, business process management and enterprise search. His technology focus has included SAP NetWeaver Process Integration, Information Builders, and Search technologies.

Jeff Schneider, Chief Executive Officer, MomentumSI Jeff founded MomentumSI, a leading enterprise SOA consulting firm, in 1997. As CEO, Jeff aligns the strategic goals of the company with those of the customers. He spends significant time working directly with clients and keeps a close eye on disruptive technologies and paradigms. Prior to founding MomentumSI, Jeff started his career at 3M working on supply chain and manufacturing systems. In 1996, he wrote the first book on Enterprise Java and continues to write for leading technology publications.

Hub Vandervoort, Chief Technology Officer, Progress Software Hub is responsible for incorporating market and customer requirements into the industry leading Progress Sonic ESB Product Family and evangelizing Progress leading-edge developments in the ESB and SOA infrastructure market. Hub previously held the position of VP of strategic services for the Sonic division. Over the last four years, he has built up a highly successful technical services group to enable Progress customers and partners to achieve rapid results with Progr