SOA debated at Open Group conference

Reference architectures for SOA were vigorously debated at the Open Group's Enterprise Architect Practitioners' conference in San Diego last week. Computer Business Review Online reports the debate ranged from the relevance of reference models and whether agile methods belong in a reference architecture, to the often similar goals of SOA and enterprise architecture.

"The rationale is that, with maturity models providing a way to benchmark your progress towards meeting your goals, the goals outlined in OSIMM might provide a good indicator of what are the component parts of an SOA," says CBR Online.

"And that's where the debate began. Some in the audience confused the maturity model with a reference model. Others questioned whether the world needed yet another reference model, saying SOA should be just another 'view' or slice of an enterprise architecture model."

Users at the same conference spoke of using SOA technologies to cut development times and get better ROI, says CIO India. But it's a tough sell.

"To obtain those kinds of advantages, you need to 'turn your organisation on its side' and incorporate SOA into thinking enterprise-wide," says Steve Wolf, senior enterprise architect, Marriott.

"What separates SOA from a minor technology change is the fact that this is a fundamental change in the way we do business," he said during a session at the conference.

Ronald Schmelzer of ZapThink has written a thought-provoking piece on the adoption of SOA in the rest of the world, relative to the US, and concludes that although the US isn't behind, neither is it ahead.

"ZapThink has seen surprising and substantial uptick in SOA-adoption in Australia, India, Korea, China, Singapore, parts of Latin and South America, and the Middle East," he writes in a research report.

"Many of these global initiatives have a particular industry bent, such as a strong telecommunications presence in Korea, banking and insurance in Australia, government in Singapore, manufacturing and services in China and India, and retail in the Latin and South American regions."