Potential Harmonization of OASIS SOA TC Activities

Mary,

I've been serving as a voting member of the OASIS SOA Reference Model TC since close to its inception and am currently serving as a voting member of this TC's SOA Reference Architecture Subcommittee (SC). Duane Nickull of Adobe Systems is our TC Chair and Francis McCabe of Genietown the SC Chair. As you know, the OASIS SOA Reference Model (SOA-RM) v1.0 was approved as an OASIS standard last October. We are currently working on development of an associated Reference Architecture for SOA (SOA-RA), which is currently under its second TC-level working draft review. We expect a full public review sometime in early '08.

My interest in the OASIS Open CSA effort and its associated SCA-* TCs is to see how this new body of work coming from the Open SOA Collaboration effort and now under the auspices of OASIS fits in with other OASIS-sponsored SOA work. One of the diagrams we used in the SOA-RM v1.0 standard attempts to depict the relation of the RM to other work. I have attached an annotated version of this graphic to include where I think the Open CSA effort fits in, specifically with respect to the various SCA-* specs. In addition, I've tried to capture where the various WS-* efforts might fit into such a
graphic depicted related SOA and Web services work managed under the auspices of OASIS.

I would very much like to hear your feedback on possible harmonization efforts across these various OASIS-sponsored SOA and activities and perhaps WS-* related activities where it makes senses. I've purposely joined as a member of the SCA-Assembly TC to gain additional insights into possible harmonization efforts. Certainly our work under the SOA-RM TC (which includes both the SOA-RM standard and the emerging SOA-RA spec) is at a higher level of abstraction than the programming model/framework offering of the various SCA-* specs. Nevertheless, I believe it would be fruitful to initiate some harmonization efforts and I believe it would better serve the greater OASIS users and stakeholder community who are inundated with emerging (and sometimes competing) specifications and standards.

On a final note, I was really looking forward to attending the OASIS Open CSA event up in Palo Alto next month but that occurs right in the middle of my wedding/honeymoon. There is at least one member of our SOA-RM TC who
is planning on attending and that is Danny Thornton. Francis McCabe is considering attendance pending his availability.

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