WEB SERVICES INTEROPERABILITY STANDARDS ORGANIZATION Introduction One approach IBM has made in open standards is to invest in, then develop and manage the appropriate standard organization. A case in point is the Web Services Interoperability Organization. In February 2002, IBM and Microsoft, together with over 50 more industry leaders, formed the new Web Services Interoperability Organization (WS-I), committed to promoting interoperability among Web services based on common, industry-accepted definitions and related XML standards support. Other WS-I founders include Accenture, BEA Systems, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Oracle, and SAP AG. It is open to all organizations committed to promoting interoperability among Web services based on industry-accepted definitions and open standards support. WS-I brings the work of multiple standards development organizations together for the purpose of providing clarity and conformance around Web services. WS-I working groups will be chartered to produce specific sets of deliverables, such as testing tools and sample Web services. These deliverables will be targeted toward providing resources to assist Web services developers. WS-I is an open industry organization chartered to promote Web services interoperability across platforms, operating systems, and programming languages. The organization works across industries and standards organizations to respond to customer needs by providing guidance, best practices, and resources for developing Web services solutions. There is a strong, complementary relationship between WS-I and other organizations committed to the growth of Web services, including its relationship to the W3C, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), and others in autonomic computing. To create interoperable Web services, and to verify that their results are compliant with both industry standards and WS-I recommended guidelines will include alliance. Key deliverables are: -
Profiles, which identify version-specific sets of Web services specifications that interoperate to support specific types of solutions. -
Sample implementations exposing interoperability issues. -
Implementation guidelines with implementation scenarios, sample solutions, and test cases illustrating compliance verification. -
A tool to monitor and log interactions with a Web service. -
An analyzer conformance testing tool, which processes sniffer logs to verify that the Web service implementation is error-free. WS-I is open to any organization supporting the goal of interoperable Web services. WS-I will aggregate collections of key Web services standards into meaningful groups that are easier for customers to work with. It will also promote the evolutionary adoption of key standards and evolve the scope and definition of profiles as required by market needs and the maturity of underlying standards. Web services and their market must grow and evolve together. Web-services profiles will help that happen. The open standard Web Services Framework document published by IBM and Microsoft[1] will serve as the foundation for the new road map, an evolving document that will identify functional areas and capabilities to be addressed by future Web services specifications. This road map will guide implementers and customers so that their work can remain compatible with the specifications as they are developed. A WS-I Profile A profile is a named group of Web services specifications at specific version levels, along with conventions about how they work together. WS-I will develop a core collection of profiles that support interoperability for general-purpose Web services functionality. Profiles make it easier to discuss Web services interoperability at a level of granularity that makes sense for developers, users, and executives making investment decisions about Web services and Web services products. WS-I focuses on compatibility at both the individual specification and profile level. To be a useful concept and avoid confusion, the number of profiles should remain relatively small. At the same time, too few profiles would force some Web services products to add unneeded features simply to conform to some profile and assert interoperability. It will be an ongoing task of WS-I to design and update profiles that reflect real Web services usage in the industry. The first profile proposed is WS-I Basic (XML Schema 1.0, SOAP 1.1, WSDL 1.1, UDDI 1.0). The development of additional or updated WS-I profiles depends on the continued evolution and maturity of Web services specifications and standards, along with additional work in message extensibility, binary attachments, routing, correlation, guaranteed message exchange, signatures, encryption, and transactions. Summary Interoperability via evolving open standards is the cornerstone of Web services. That is why WS-I is crucial for ensuring the continued deployment and success of Web services technology within and between enterprises. The momentum of vendors and the cross-industry commitment behind WS-I demonstrate that the Web services community is maturing and focusing on customer needs. WS-I will speed the worldwide adoption of Web services by providing critical interoperability guidance and testing materials that work across multiple platforms. Customers implementing Web services want their investment to comply with the existing standards-based model that enables interoperability and fast time to market. WS-I will provide clarity, guidance, and direction concerning Web services, which customers are requesting as they move into the Web services model of computing. |
