RE: [soa-rm] Definition of "Service Consumer"

[Rex Brooks <rexb@starbourne.com>]

Title: RE: [soa-rm] Definition of "Service Consumer"

I think we need further discussion. I would like to see the definition of service consumer, even though it is a compound term and might be hyphenated in plain English "service-consumer" and created as a Class in UML as "ServiceConsumer," and all first order SOA Terms, discussed in the context of a definition of "IT" as the domain of SOA. So, I guess what I am saying is that I think we need to chew over the charter and vote on it even though, presumably, we all bought into the charter as-was. By that I mean the sentence:

"A reference model is not directly tied to any standards, technologies or other concrete implementation details, but it does seek to provide a common semantics that can be used unambiguously across and between different implementations."

I really do believe that SOA, in broad terms, is applicable outside the realm of IT, but the term arose within it and either it should be bounded by an accepted definition of "Information Technology" in general and "knowledge management" in particular. Or we should define our own particular context, since, as a matter of fact, when we have a plumbing leak in our domiciles, we become agents seeking to consume a "plumbing" service in a very literal "SOA" where the architecture is the architecture of traditional scope even if we try to manage it through our own efforts researching the specific field by whatever means necessary, as anyone who has engaged in this exercise out of necessity at some time in their lives can readily attest... the point being that we need to get our "logical ducks" in a row as well as other considerations such as defining our audience, working top-down, bottom-up or mixing and matching methodologies.

Ciao,

Rex

At 7:06 AM -0400 4/8/05, Chiusano Joseph wrote:

> Please also include my suggestion of
> "entity (human or machine)" for
> additional choices (I'm sure you sent this before you read my e-mail
> on
> that).
>
> Thanks,
> Joe
>
> Joseph Chiusano
> Booz Allen Hamilton
> Visit us online@ http://www.boozallen.com
>  
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Gregory A. Kohring [mailto:kohring@ccrl-nece.de]
> > Sent: Friday, April 08, 2005 2:35 AM
> > To: soa-rm@lists.oasis-open.org
> > Subject: Re: [soa-rm] Definition of "Service
> Consumer"
> >
> >
> > Here is a summary of yesterdays proposals for defining the
> > term "Service Consumer":
> >
> > 1) Software that invokes an instance,
> >
> > 2) Software that uses a service instance,
> >
> > 3) An agent that wishes to interact with a service,
> >
> > 4) An agent that interacts with a service in order to
> >     achieve a goal,
> >
> > 5) An entity that binds with a service is playing the
> >     role of service consumer,
> >
> > where the suggested definition of "agent" was:
> >
> > 1) An Agent is a software program acting on behalf of an
> owner.
> >
> > (By substituting this definition in some of the above
> > suggestions you can come up with yet more definitions of
> > service consumer.)
> >
> >
> > Now, just out of curiosity, how do we proceed from here?
> > Do we vote on one of the suggested definitions? (This implies
> > we should vote on the definitions of all the terms to be used
> > in the final document.) Or do we leave it up to the editors
> > to pick the definition which best fits the style of writing
> > being used within the final document?
> >
> >
> > -- Greg
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> >
> ======================================================================
> > G.A. Kohring
> > C&C Research Laboratories, NEC Europe Ltd.
> >
> ======================================================================
> >

-- 

Rex Brooks
President, CEO
Starbourne Communications Design
GeoAddress: 1361-A Addison
Berkeley, CA 94702
Tel: 510-849-2309