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Subject: RE: [soa-rm] RE: Service definition at nauseum


I am okay with this with one addition:

 

A service (in the context of SOA) is a business relevant capability or function offered and packaged by a provider and made accessible to consumers where access is provided using a prescribed interface that abstracts (or hides) the implementation details of the capability or function, and is exercised consistent with the contracts and policies as specified by its description.

 

The business related addition is an extremely important point here. Without it there is no difference between SOA and distributed computing

 

From: Bashioum, Christopher D [mailto:cbashioum@mitre.org]
Sent: Friday, April 23, 2010 9:15 AM
To: Estefan, Jeff A (3100); soa-rm@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: RE: [soa-rm] RE: Service definition at nauseum

 

Jeff,

 

I think I’m ok with this, but there is some tweaking we need to do still.  I’m thinking about the “offered by a provider for a consumer” part.  There is a subtlety here that is important to get at, and that I believe you were attempting to get at when you mentioned “accessed via a technology nuetral interface” in a previous email. 

 

I think the basic idea is something along the lines of “offered by a provider for a class of consumers”, or “offered by a provider for a ‘generic consumer’” or something along those lines.  What we are getting at is that the service is sort of generic in nature, it is not optimized for a particular customer.

 

The way we “used to” do things was to  focus on the capability and do specific integrations as necessary if anyone “else” wanted to make use of that capability.  With SOA, the emphasis is on the “offered to others”, and all that that entails (especially when the “others” are part of another ownership domain).

 

That’s really what we were trying to get at when using the term “mechanism to access a capability”. 

 

I’ve been thinking about this a *lot* because I realize that the definition that we currently have in the RM has been distasteful for many, and I think has been the cause for less adoption of the RM than we would have hoped.  The concept is correct, but the language has been a stumbling block.

 

So ... if we can capture the idea of “offering for the generic others” I think we will be in good shape.

 

Note also that the term capability is really a potential for something, not the actual doing of something.  The noun “service” is the “performance of duties or work for another”.  Another definition has the “performance of a function for another”.  The term function may be more applicable than capability, where capability speaks of the potential to do work (capability: qualities, abilities, features, etc., that can be used or developed; potential) and function speaks more of a repeatable “chunk” of work.

 

How’s this for a tweak?

 

A service (in the context of SOA) is a capability or function offered and packaged by a provider and made accessible to consumers where access is provided using a prescribed interface that abstracts (or hides) the implementation details of the capability or function, and is exercised consistent with the contracts and policies as specified by its description.

 

 

From: Estefan, Jeff A (3100) [mailto:jeffrey.a.estefan@jpl.nasa.gov]
Sent: Friday, April 23, 2010 2:37 AM
To: soa-rm@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: RE: [soa-rm] RE: Service definition at nauseum

 

Colleagues,

 

Now that some of the message traffic has settled, here’s another update to the proposed SOA service definition that should be closer to the mark while allowing for a little wiggle room.

 

A service (in the context of SOA) is a capability offered by a provider for a consumer where access is provided using a prescribed interface that abstracts (or hides) the implementation details of the capability, and is exercised consistent with the contracts and policies as specified by its description.

 

Will follow up the threads after the weekend.

 

Regards...

 

 - Jeff


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