Implementation subgroup call 10/13

[Diane Jordan <drj@us.ibm.com>]

Attendees on the implementation subgroup call today were: Monica Martin, 
Ron Ten Hove, Mike Marin, Ugo Corda, Rania Khalaf, Sazi Temel, Bernd 
Eckenfels.
Major points of discussion (feel free to correct, comment or add to this): 

- Interoperability for BPEL has a couple facets.  By virtue of being based 
on web services, a level of interoperability is obtained.  For this level 
of interoperability we should reference the work of WSI and BP1.0.  We 
discussed whether there is a higher level of interoperablity for BPEL 
which would involve the ability for BPEL processes on different 
deployments to interoperate on a collaborative business process.  This 
concept needs further definition and may evolve from the work of this 
subgroup. 
- Portability would be the next level to explore after the intrinsic web 
services based interoperability.  By this we mean the ability to deploy a 
BPEL  process to different BPEL implementation and get the same results at 
least in the interpretation of the process by the BPEL engine.  The 
execution may vary based on the deployment environment and bindings and 
actual messages on the wire will differ because of  bindings.   Identical 
message flows at this level would not be an objective of portability but 
might come into play for interoperability.
- Scenarios for interoperability and portability would help us to 
crystalize these points.  Sazi has a use case showing interoperability 
that he will share with us for the next call.  We noted that the use case 
subgroup is developing use cases top down based on business requirements 
whereas the scenarios we're talking about would be more bottoms up 
technology examples. 
- Interoperability at the business process level may bring up QoS issues, 
for example reliable messaging.   Since there are other specs that attempt 
to address many of these issues that are not widely accepted yet,  we will 
avoid dependancies on them and scope our work to the functions absolutely 
required. 
- we have an offer to hold the next face to face in Melbourne Fla either 
the first or second week of Dec.  If we had enough interest we can arrange 
for space for an implementation workshop of some sort - possibilities 
range from a showcase of members' implementations to some interoperability 
or portability work.  It was noted that it might be very aggressive to try 
to do portability or interoperability work in that timeframe.  I will 
discuss this on the next TC call and see if we have sufficient interest 
(eg, at least 3-5 companies willing to at bring implementations).  In a 
later conversation, I was asked if this would be a public event, and I do 
not think it should be. 
- It was suggested that we might want to include consideration of  tooling 
products that produce BPEL as we proceed with implementations. 
- This group is not intended to focus exclusively on portability and 
interoperability although the first two meetings were spend discussing 
this.   As a group with particular expertise and interest in BPEL 
implementations,  there are many types of input that would be valuable to 
the TC and other members of this subgroup (maintaining appropriate 
confidentiality regarding your companies' plans, products, etc. ).  Since 
the subgroup is not "normative", it will not have formal work products or 
issues independent of the full TC but can make recommendations to the TC.  
Additional topics of discussion related to implementations should be sent 
to the email list.

Thanks for your participation - next call is Oct. 27.

Regards, Diane
IBM  Dynamic e-business Technologies
drj@us.ibm.com
(919)254-7221 or 8-444-7221, Mobile: 919-624-5123