I would say that they are all correct, and all equally useful. The best
situation would be to have a single definition that comprises all of
these, as they each point out valuable and important aspects of SOA.

Now would be a good time for me to mention that the OASIS SOA Reference
Model (SOA-RM) TC has just approved as a Committee Draft the following
spec:
http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/15966/wd-soa-rm-11.pdf
(distribution is unlimited, document is public). We have not yet updated
the cover page to reflect the Candidate Draft status, as the vote was
finalized late yesterday. 

As a TC member (whose company also is a member of the Editing team), I
am extremely proud of what we have accomplished in less than one year,
since our first meeting on 03/22/05. As one of our next steps (beyond
getting this spec to OASIS Specification status), we plan to create one
or more "reference architectures" that are based on the reference model,
and are more concrete than it (but less concrete than actual
implementations).

If anyone has trouble accessing the spec, please let me know and I will
send it to you as an attachment.

Joe

Joseph Chiusano
Associate
Booz Allen Hamilton
 
700 13th St. NW, Suite 1100
Washington, DC 20005
O: 202-508-6514  
C: 202-251-0731
Visit us online@ http://www.boozallen.com
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bullard, Claude L (Len) [mailto:len.bullard@i...] 
> Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 10:04 AM
> To: xml-dev@l...
> Subject: [xml-dev] Will The Real SOA Please Sit Down?
> 
> Given the following definitions, 
> 
> o  Which is more wrong than the others. 
> 
> o  Which is the least useful?
> 
> "SOA is an architectural paradigm whose goal is to achieve 
> loose coupling among interacting software applications. 
> Applications invoke a series of discrete services in order to 
> perform a certain task. A service is a unit of work done by a 
> service provider to achieve desired end results for a service 
> consumer." Amir Shevat
> http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/8951
> 
> (Service-Oriented Architecture) Formerly called a 
> "distributed objects"
> architecture, the
> SOA term was coined at the turn of the century as Web 
> services were evolving. CORBA and DCOM are examples of 
> earlier SOAs. See CORBA, DCOM and Web services. - Computer 
> Desktop Encyclopedia via Answers.com
> 
> "The SOA abstracts and exposes business functions as services 
> that connect multiple business applications in homogeneous or 
> heterogeneous environments." Oracle magazine
> 
> len
> 
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