randy heffner vice president forrester research

Real-World SOA: SOA Platform Patterns You Can UseRandy Heffner

Vice President

Forrester Research

July 19, 2005. Call in at 10:55 a.m. Eastern Time

Theme

Evolve your SOA platform according to your business

needs — working from your existing infrastructure

Six stylized paths to SOA

• Your path to SOA will borrow and combine elements from six generic paths to SOA:

» Simple internal integration

» Infrastructure services

» Rich internal integration

» Multichannel applications

» External partner integration

» Core business flexibility

Ser

vice

life

cycl

e en

viro

nmen

t

Core application platforms

SOA platform vision — three core value propositions

…

Service delivery network

Ser

vice

com

man

d pl

atfo

rm

Service clients

Service interfaces

Co

ntr

ol

Ch

ang

e

Connection

Queensland Transport — Early SOA (1997)

• Regional government agency in Australia

• Applications

» Vehicle titles and registration, customer service appointments, distribution of public information

» SLAs: 2 sec response for 90% of txns (XML-RPC)

• Key choices

» Implement services using native J2EE and CICS servers

» XML only for external interfaces

» Simple solutions for security and interface definition

• Paths to SOA

» Integration (simple internal, external), infrastructure services, multichannel applications

Pattern: Non-SOAP, basic SOA

J2EE (Borland)

Business services

Oracle

Custom XML server

CICS

Business services

DB2AllFusion Gen tools

Web server

Web applications

CA WSDM(future)

XML Schemas XML-RPC

External partners

Public access

PKI Web server

CA AllFusion Gen CA AllFusion Gen

InternalExternal

Custom web framework

monitoringmanagement

HP OpenView

J2EE callsCICS

services

XMLSpy

Two-way SSL

Queensland Transport — Lessons

• SO is a business model, not a technical solution

» It’s about business transformation

» Think through the full value chain, not just internal processes

• Use business process analysis to find services of value

• Be prepared for service support issues

» End users will come to you when they have issues, not to an intermediate provider

Unique (Zurich Airport) — SOA-based portal

• Manages the operations of Zurich airport

• Applications

» Airport management portal — integrates data and transactions from multiple outsourced systems

» Up to 50 msgs/sec @ 20 ms to 500 ms latency (most messages are very small)

• Key choices

» Require each externally hosted application to expose SOAP

» Single access channel to integrate applications

• Paths to SOA

» Rich internal integration, quasi-external integration

Pattern: Layered SOAP, reliable delivery SOA

SourceSafe

SOAP

.NET / Windows 2003 Server

Business services

webMethods

webMethods tools

Airport management portal

SOAP SOAP SOAP

Airport operations Radar data Baggage Other

SOAP

Local data cache

User interaction

Other(flight status)

Private network connections to externally hosted applications

reliable delivery

events

monitoring

policyXMLSpy

VS.NET

Unique (Zurich Airport) — Lessons

• Separate service specification and implementation

» First, define the service interface

» Design interfaces based on process requirements

» Then, design how to fulfill the service

• Do not put business logic in the delivery network

• Get an early handle on governance of data semantics

Large financial institution — SOAP-centric SOA

• Applications

» Customer systems, check image services, account inquiry, insurance services

» Started with XML over MQ, now moving to Web services

» Tested to 300 request/reply roundtrips per second

• Key choices

» Focused on unifying service access

» Focused on performance of XML transformations

» Avoided repository (so far), but addressed vocabulary management

• Paths to SOA

» Simple and rich internal integration, multichannel applications

Pattern: Unified service delivery network SOA

Systinet

WebLogictools

Service consumersOpenView

(no WSM)Contivo

WebLogic Server (J2EE) IMSNonStop• Compensating transaction capabilities implemented in services• Native protocols used to connect to downstream applications

metadata mgttransforms

DataPower

WebLogic Integration

SOAPSOAP

XML over MQ

Compensating transaction logic implemented in service consumers

WebSphere MQSOAP

Systinet tools

Nativetools

transforms adaptation

monitor / mgt

enhancedSOAP

Scripting toolsdeployment

SOAP

XMLSpy

Large financial institution — Lessons

• Getting IT executive buy-in to SOA vision is very important

» Enterprise-level funding because CIO gets the vision

• Start small and learn, then get a couple of big, visible projects

» Be sure projects know that SOA is an executive priority

» Do “project interventions” to identify and design good service interfaces — and to build project team competency

• Web services standards are only a start: much more work is required

• Don’t worry about a repository until you have the discipline to use it

Large North American bank — Custom SOA

• Applications

» Centered around customer information: retail banking, check images, stop payment

» Mission-critical volumes for internal applications

» External response times typically less than 2 seconds

• Key choices

» Continue to leverage high QoS of custom middleware

» Work with multiple existing EAI products

» Unify legacy service interfaces on the mainframe

• Paths to SOA

» Integration (simple, rich, external), multichannel applications

Pattern: Diverse, custom delivery network SOA

VS.NET

.NET

SOAP / RMI

TIBCOVitria

BizTalk

CICS

DataPower

WebSphere

WebSphere Studio

EAI tools Custom middleware

Service consumers(internal)

routingencryption

identity propagation

Word of mouth“repository”

Rational

IMS

WebSphere 390

Tivoli(no WSM)

PKI

Aion

BPMMetadata

mgt

Identity & access

mgt

SOAP

External partners

DMZ security


Future leverage

Legacy tools

Sun ONE meta-

directory

Large North American bank — Lessons

• Reuse is nice, but business agility is the real payback

» Good service design enables “pluggable business” (e.g., business process outsourcing)

• Semantics (data, interface) can make or break you

• Many services management issues tie back to your firm’s standard for message headers

» If it’s not in the header, you can’t manage it

• Central funding is critical for thinking through your architecture strategy

Thomson Prometric — SOA for flexibility

• Manages certification test delivery at 4,000 training centers

• 300+ external partners (test owners)

• Applications

» Test center scheduling and capacity management, test delivery

» No concerns about messaging volumes — can scale using load balancing in standard ways

• Key choices

» Use orchestration to overcome underlying application limitations

» Use Web services management for policy and versioning

» Implement a dual-identity scheme (test owners, test takers)

• Paths to SOA

» Internal (rich, external), multichannel applications, core flexibility

Pattern: Process and policy driven SOA

VS.NET

BizTalk

Actional

Reactivity

J2EE tools

OpenView

Prometric’sWeb applications


policyversion resolution

encryptionidentity (dual)

Web page“repository”

Visio orchestrationreliable messaging

B2B connections

rules enginecompensating txns

LDAP

Partner Web apps

Manual deployment

.NET WebLogic WebSphere

Thomson Prometric — Lessons

• How much your SOA will achieve is limited by how big your SOA thinking is

• Business process modeling is core to SOA success

» Craft new processes, don’t just document existing processes

• Orchestration provides one of the biggest value opportunities within SOA

» Process/workflow centric knowledge worker applications enabled by the underlying services

Overall themes and recommendations

• Business drives architecture

» Guide SOA evolution based on business needs

» Leverage existing infrastructure

» SOA creates opportunities for “pluggable business”

• As a strategy for business design, SOA applies to many scenarios

» Services must be designed in a process-centric way

• Learn from emerging patterns in the real world

» Start SOA platform design with the service delivery network

» Orchestration is a good first step into greater levels ofSOA flexibility

Selected bibliography

• March 29, 2005, Trends “The Elements Of SOA Maturity”

• March 29, 2005, Trends “Your Strategic SOA Platform Vision”

• December 7, 2004, Trends “Your Paths To Service-Oriented Architecture”

• June 18, 2004, Trends “The Big Strategic Impact Of Organic Business And Service-Oriented Architecture”

• August 13, 2004, Tech Choices “What Is An Enterprise Service Bus?”

• July 16, 2003, Planning Assumption “Service Orientation: Service-Based Design Is The High-Value Investment”

• October 27, 2003, Planning Assumption “Case Studies Show Incremental Path To Service-Oriented Architecture ”

• April 1, 2004, Best Practices “Nine Tips For SOA Implementation”

randy heffner vice president forrester research

Documents