Sub Comittee and/or User guide

[Duane Nickull <dnickull@adobe.com>]

All:

I have read through the last batch of email.  There are a couple of 
things I would like to propose for comments. Please read this entire 
email before replying.

1. I will concede that many members of the public will likely have the 
same kinds of trouble interpreting a reference model vs. a reference 
architecture vs a specific architecture as seems to be pervasive on this 
list.  If we have the problem in our context, it is likely to be present 
outside of this list.

2. We cannot redefine what a "reference model" is or what it includes.  
If we tried to change the industry definition of reference model to one 
that has concrete items in it or things that are not part of SOA (which 
is tricky since it is still undefined), it will not be a true reference 
model and hence not accepted by industry. 

3. Service provider and service consumer are not part of a reference 
model.  They are roles visible only in a runtime or infrastructure views 
of a specific architecture.  To prove this point, please look once again 
at the OSI reference model.  It is a communications stack RM yet does 
not contain notions of a message sender and message receiver. 

4. We cannot mix abstract concepts and "things people can chew on" 
(implying concrete items) in our work.  Such does run adverse to 
accepted architectural conventions.

SOLUTION:

One way forward is to probably create a sub committee to work on a 
reference architecture for SOA.  A Reference Architecture could be 
developed in parallel to the reference model and is fair game to 
illustrate things like security, consumers, providers, agents etc.  It 
is within our charter to do such.

After reading through some older emails, I would assert that such a 
thing is probably essential along with some  sort of white paper or user 
guide that explains the relationships between the RM, the RA and other 
architecture.

Reference Model
(is a guide for developing a)
[ Reference Architecture || * Architecture ]

There are several people on this list who also have stated specific 
needs for what they see in SOA.  Perhaps this may be a good Sub 
Committee (SC) consideration also. 

Government Service Oriented Reference Architecture???
etc.

I can already see there are many of you who could lead such an effort as 
a sub committee. 

Comments?

Duane

-- 
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Senior Standards Strategist - Adobe Systems, Inc. - http://www.adobe.com
Vice Chair - UN/CEFACT Bureau Plenary - http://www.unece.org/cefact/
Adobe Enterprise Developer Resources  - http://www.adobe.com/enterprise/developer/main.html
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