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SOA for the Business Developer: Concepts, BPEL, and SCA (Business Developers series) - page 5

Preface

Overview

Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is a way of organizing software. If your company's development projects adhere to the principles of SOA, the outcome is an inventory of modular units called services , which allow for a quick response to change.

That's it, more or less. So why read the book?

We tell the story as simply as possible to keep you from the heartbreak of MEGO ( My Eyes Glaze Over ). We assume that you have an elementary knowledge of software, but we give you a fast explanation of any phrase that might leave you uncertain . At the same time, we offer examples and illustrations, giving a practical meaning to abstract ideas.

The book can make you feel comfortable as you start to work with service-oriented products, but there's more. The level of detail will enable you to get the most out of technical articles and even to explore the publicly available specifications that describe the technology in depth.

Clarity and Imagination

In November 2006, the magazine Network Computing published a survey of its readers and found that SOA is the "technology buzzword they most despise." Respondents said that their primary concerns were threefold: a lack of familiarity ("What does that stand for again?"); a sense of being overwhelmed (SOA "gives me a headache "); and a perception that the technology "is useful but still too complex and expensive." We personally know of software professionals who dismiss the excitement about services. The perception of some people is that SOA is a marketing ploy or is, at most, a small variation on older technologies.

In truth, SOA includes ideas that have been around for decades. Information hiding, for example, has long meant that a developer can access an existing unit of logic without needing to learn details that are internal to that logic. Even developers in the 1960s wrote modular code, adding building blocks to an inventory of software.

Our reading, however, is that SOA is both genuine and a genuine advance, bringing the older ideas into the world of networked computers. Even if some people are dismissive or choose to wait for tools that simplify service development at less initial expense, we believe that the needs of business will force the adoption of the newer technology. The way of the future is to deploy accessible and more-or-less independent services on varied platforms.

Two characteristics can hasten the transition to SOA. The first is clarity. This book offers technical detail not only because developers need it to fulfill their jobs but because non-developers can interpret situations better if they understand how the technology works.

A second desired characteristic is imagination. Any company can fulfill the promise of the technology to a degree; but the fulfillment is greatest if at least some developers extend their expertise from programming to the details of what the business does and then to the details of what the business might do in the future. To provide insight into the kind of imagination required, this book offers a business scenario.

A Note to the General Reader

We'd like to address the reader who is stretching to understand software of any kind.

We hear a whisper from behind us. "Please! You can't expect someone who lacks a background in software to understand the details of SOA!" The objection is duly noted, and now we have a story to tell.

We gave an early copy of this book to a professor of neuroscience, a man whose work clarifies how multiple genes affect brain function. After reading and pondering, the man asked, "What do you mean by 'run time'?" He spoke with us and soon came to his own conclusion: "Run time is the duration during which a unit of software (for example, an email program) is available for use."

We want to encourage readers who are unfamiliar with even the most basic concepts of software. SOA is not neuroscience. You can pick up a lot of the fundamentals quickly, and this book (with a little research) can introduce you to an important if hidden aspect of modern business.

Let's turn now to the specific technologies covered.

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Margolis B., Sharpe J.

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